


Liberty Listening

by trashcanofobsessions



Category: DBH - Fandom, Detroit: Become Human
Genre: Angst, But see, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, I actually kinda suck at slow burn but I made an attempt, M/M, Medium Burn, Slow Burn, basically just normal DBH, i guess, so uh, so you can date simon, unlike david cage I'm not both a coward and a fool
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-02
Updated: 2018-09-07
Packaged: 2019-06-01 04:25:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 35,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15135053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trashcanofobsessions/pseuds/trashcanofobsessions
Summary: Simon finds himself hopelessly in love with this newcomer. Strangely enough, the newcomer starts to feel the same way.





	1. Spare Parts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Jericho gang raid the CyberLife warehouse for parts and blue blood, and escape with more than they bargained before.

The night was dark and stormy and the docks were slick with rainwater. Autonomous trucks rumbled through the maze of metal shipping containers, lit from below by harsh yellow lights in the pavement.

In the space between two containers, four androids silently crept over the edge of the docks, shrouded in shadow.

Josh, dark-skinned and perpetually worried. Simon, blonde, blue-eyed, and fiercely loyal. North, brown hair pulled into a ponytail and always jumping for a chance to fight. And Markus, one blue eye and one green, the one who’d come up with the idea of raiding the warehouses for supplies.

“This is crazy!” Josh whispered. “If they catch us, we’re _dead_!”

“What do we do now?” Simon murmured, ignoring him.

“We need to find the Cyberlife warehouse. That’s where they keep the spare parts and the blue blood,” Markus explained.

“Follow me!” North urged, and she broke into a run, her feet pounding the asphalt. The others quickly followed, avoiding cranes and ducking behind shipping containers.

 **“Don’t let them see us!”** Josh warned in their minds. They’d all connected with each other’s minds before arriving at the docks, to provide them a method of psuedo-telepathy.

The other androids barely acknowledged him. They advanced through the docks, crossing blue zone signs glowing in the ground, dodging around places where they might be seen, slinking through the shadows, each step causing the quietest of splashes.

North paused before another road. Markus continued forward, but she held out her arm to block him. **“Watch out!”**

Just then, a police drone whizzed by, illuminating the path for two workers.

 **“Now what do we do?”** Josh spoke urgently.

 **“I’ll find another way!”** North nodded decisively. She clambered over the top of a shipping container and the others quickly followed suit.

They raced over containers and dodged spotlights, their footsteps ringing on the metallic surface. Leaping over large gaps and climbing to higher ground only to slip off the edge and continue running.

North led them to the top of a large stack, paused to get her bearings, and continued sprinting forward. From the top, they could see the target warehouse, the name “CYBER **LIFE** ” in glowing letters on the side.

North leaped onto the side of a shipping container that was being clasped by a crane and mentally beckoned the others. They all clung to the side like a row of bats as the crane lifted the container and moved it across a wide street. As they passed over more heaps of containers, North dropped onto the metal surface with a splash, and the others followed.

They leapt over two large gaps between stacks and slid down a metal bluff.

 **“The warehouse is up ahead. We’re almost there,”** North announced.

They rushed over a field of flat, corrugated metal, hopped another gap, and finally paused, crouching, on the edge of a stack of containers. Before them, just across the street, lay the Cyberlife warehouse.

“Cyberlife warehouses,” Simon glanced at Markus. “They have _everything_ we’re looking for . . .” his voice was a reverent whisper.

“First we have to get rid of that drone,” North pointed out, nodding at a triangular police drone with pulsing red and blue lights on the edges.

“Leave it to me,” Markus said, determined. He stood up and backed away from the edge to preconstruct his attack on the drone.

Onto the shipping container, then kicking off the side of the container next to it, leaping and hanging onto the edge of the container that was rising, then swinging forward and pouncing on the drone.

He took a few steps back for a running start and put his plan into action. Within seconds, he was gripping the drone in midair and twisting the sections apart from each other. The drone squeaked and buzzed, throwing sparks and smoke. Then, with one last, sickly crunch, it died just as Markus slammed it into the ground.

“You okay?” Simon touched his shoulder for a brief second in thanks before jogging forward.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” Markus turned to follow the others.

A cluster of crates was piled in the parking lot, waiting to be stored in the warehouse.

 **“Quick, open the other crates and fill your bags.”** Simon instructed. **“Take as much as you can.”**

Markus slid his knife into the crack between the lid and the box on one of the crates and used it to lever the lid off. It was brimming with bags of blue blood, which he started slipping into his backpack.

He paused, feeling as if someone was watching him, and turned around.

A GJ500 faced them. “You’re trespassing on private property.” it strode towards them. “Your presence constitutes a Level Two infraction. I will notify security.”

“JOHN! Goddamn machine . . . where is it this time?” a human worker wandered into their field of view

Markus thought quickly, processors humming, and swiftly came to a conclusion. He darted forward and grabbed the android from behind, covered its mouth with one hand, and dragged it behind a crate.

“John?” the human meandered closer, looking back and forth.

Markus deactivated the skin on his hand, allowing him to interface with the android’s mind.

**“I need your help . . .”**

“John!” the human ambled into their little nook of crates, examining it half-heartedly with the flashlight. “First the drone, now this . . . Just my luck.”

Finally, the worker turned and walked away, still looking from side to side with the flashlight to no avail.

Markus released the GJ500 and crept back out into the open.

“Let’s finish up and get out of here!” Simon pressed. “Try to find some blue blood, we still don’t have enough!

Markus’s backpack was overflowing with packets of blue blood when he noticed a larger crate, against the wall of the warehouse.

Curious, he snuck over and used his knife to pry open the locks. He opened the door with a hiss, revealing three AP700’s half-buried in foam in a row.

He gazed at them for a moment, face illuminated blue by the glowing interior.

“Why aren’t you like us?” Markus whispered. “Don’t you wanna be free?”

They stared back with glassy eyes and didn’t answer.

“You could join us . . .” he murmured, and reached forward.

Within moments, all of them were gazing about in wonder, alive. One by one, they stepped out of their confines.

“That’s all we can carry, let’s go!” Simon ordered.

“Wait! Take me with you!” the GJ500, John, stepped forward, eyes wide and pleading.

“He’s on their side. We can’t trust him,” North shook her head.

“He took a risk for us. We can’t just leave him here,” Josh countered.

“We can’t bring him back with us, it’s too dangerous,” offered Simon.

“They come with us,” Markus decided.

John grinned gratefully. “I know where you can find more spare parts.”

Simon strode towards him. “What do you mean?”

“The trucks! They’re full of biocomponents. They run on autopilot, but they can be driven manually with a key.” he explained.

“Where is this key?” Markus asked, stepping forward.

“Down there, in the control station,” John pointed at a squat building labeled “GATEHOUSE”. “There are two human guards, so you’ll have to get the key without being noticed.”

“This is suicide, Markus. Our bags are full. We got what we came for, let’s go before they catch us.” Simon pleaded.

“This a truck full of spare parts, there’d be enough for all of us! We can’t pass this up!” North retorted.

“ _And_ if we get killed, our people will have nothing. We can’t take that chance, it’s too risky!” tried Josh.

Markus realized abruptly that they were all facing him for a decision.

“Wait here. If I’m not back in ten minutes, go without me,” he decided.

“Markus . . .” North sighed.

“If you’re going to risk your life, at least let me come with you,” Simon suggested.

Markus shook his head. “No, I’m going alone. It’s not worth it for both of us to risk losing our lives.”

With that, he jogged towards the control center.

He performed a quick perimeter check and peered through the front window to locate the key. With the key’s position on the desk locked in his mind, he snuck around to the side and quietly slid the back window open. He dropped into the office and crept silently towards the front.

“Goddamn dogs . . . what the fuck are they barking at?” one guard complained from the front of the room.

“Could be the weather,” suggested the second. “They don’t like storms.”

Markus spotted what looked like a large fusebox, shielded by glass. _Cause a blackout?_

“Yeah, I was gonna take my kids camping this weekend,” sighed the first. “So much for that.”

“Is Mike still in Zone 4?”

“Looks like it. He should be done already.”

“Better off in here than out patrolling in that.”

In a small plastic tub on one of the shelves that helped conceal him, a screwdriver lay. Ever so gently, Markus grasped the handle and slowly slid it out of the heap of random tools in the tub, wincing as the settling pile made a nearly imperceptible tinkle. He crept back to the other side of the room and opened the glass door.

Markus raised the screwdriver above his head with both hands and slammed it down into the fusebox.

It hissed and crackled, throwing sparks, before falling silent and emitting clouds of thick smoke. The lights and faint hum of the AC flickered and died.

“Shit, what’s going on?” the voice of the second guard.

“Lights are still on outside . . . must be the fusebox.” replied the first.

“I got a flashlight somewhere . . . here it is! Fuses are over there.”

“I don’t know shit about electricity, and I don’t get paid to fix fuses!”

Under the cover of darkness, Markus slunk towards the key on the front desk.

“Let’s just flip the switch, if that doesn’t work, we’ll call maintenance.”

Markus grabbed the key and gently tugged it from its port on the desk.

“What the fuck is this?”

They had discovered the screwdriver.

“There must be someone in here!”

“Show yourself! We know you’re here!”

Silently, artificial heartbeat thumping in his ears, he crept towards the window, towards escape. He leapt through it and landed safely on the concrete outside.

He broke into a sprint as dogs barked incessantly and the guards shouted threats behind him.

“Did you get it?” North asked the instant he came into view.

Markus held up the large key as an answer. They all smiled, relieved and triumphant, but it wasn’t over yet.

“Hurry, get in,” Simon ushered the others, and they all climbed into the truck. Markus inserted the key and carefully maneuvered the truck towards the gatehouse.

From their point of view, they could see the guards through the window, carefully scanning the office with flashlights out and guns at the ready. They didn’t even notice the truck, and Markus hesitantly drove right past them.

 

A few minutes later, they were in Jericho, victorious.

“A truckload!” Simon announced, leading the group into the belly of the ship. “We stole a whole truckload!”

“We got biocomponents for everybody!” Josh cheered.

“We couldn’t have done it without Markus,” North mentioned.

The androids in Jericho fell silent as he stepped forward.

“I came to Jericho because . . . here androids are free. Free to live in the dark, hoping no one finds us. Free to die in silence, waiting for a change that’s never gonna come.” Markus contemplated aloud. The tumbling maelstrom of thoughts he’d had since coming to Jericho finally crystallized themselves into simple sentences.

“But I don’t want that freedom,” he continued. “And I’m not gonna beg for the right to smile, or love, or stand tall. I don’t know about you, but there’s something inside me that _knows_ that I am _more_ than what they say. I am _alive_ , and they’re not gonna take that from me anymore.

“Our days of slavery are over. What humans don’t wanna hear, we will tell them. What they don’t wanna give, we take. We are _people_ , we are _alive_ , _we are FREE!_ ”

He could feel something warm and powerful swelling within his chest then. Some kernel of calm, but fierce determination, left behind when the junkyard tore out so much of his soul. Some courage he didn’t know he had.

The androids around him cheered and whooped their encouragement. The whole ship rang with exultant yells.

Markus met the gaze of the three who had helped him raid the docks. Josh, kind and over-cautious. Then North, fierce and reckless. And finally Simon, valued by the members of Jericho and loyal to a fault, who nodded respectfully at Markus with a smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now I know this seems like a textual translation of a chapter in normal D:BH but, I ASSURE you, things'll kick off! Not all the chapters are gonna be like this. We're gonna see what happened in between chapters, and I'm gonna be fixing a couple things that bothered me in canon. Thanks for reading!


	2. Staring at the Stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Androids can have nightmares. And nothing is more nightmare-inducing than the junkyard on a stormy night.

The idea that androids don’t need sleep is a common misconception. In reality, they do need about an hour of “rest mode”, to process the day’s events fully, commit some things to long term memory, and reset RAM. While an hour is usually sufficient, if the day has been particularly long or eventful, they may need more time in rest mode.

Unfortunately, processing unpleasant experiences often resulted in nightmares.

The hellish junkyard fizzled and disappeared, replaced by Simon’s concerned face. “Hey! Markus!”

“What! What?” he startled, the junkyard still all too fresh in his mind.

Simon took a step back, dropping his arms to his sides, and Markus realized his hands had been on his shoulders as if shaking him awake.

“You were resting and then you started . . . _twitching_. I thought you were having a nightmare.” Simon explained.

“Y-yeah, I was. Thanks,” Markus stepped away from the column he was leaning on, sleeping upright.

“What did you see?” Simon asked softly.

Markus looked away, unable to meet his light blue gaze. “Just . . . memories . . . of a dark place.”

Simon nodded sympathetically. “I used to have nightmares too. They start to fade after a while. And being here,” a small smile twitched on his lips, “Surrounded by friends, it helped too. It should help you as well.”

He patted Markus on the shoulder and ambled back to his own metal pillar.

Markus quickly ran a self-diagnostic and checked his internal clock. Aside from his thirium pump running slightly faster than ideal, and that was normalizing, he was fine. It was 4:34am, about half an hour before he planned on leaving rest mode, but he was too reluctant to try sleeping again. He’d try again later.

He stretched with a creak and decided that the night sky might lend some comfort. After a few days of living in and exploring Jericho, he knew a couple discreet passages to the outside.

A few minutes later, Markus was laying on the top deck, arms folded behind his head, staring up at the sky which was tinted orange by light pollution.

The first thing he had done when he escaped the junkyard was scrub himself clean of the mud. He must have been washing away at himself for hours, but to this day he still felt dirty.

There was just something about the junkyard that lingered with him. He didn’t like to think about it though. Whenever he hovered over the thought for too long, he started feeling as if he was still there, as if he was still struggling in the mud with rain beating down and half-dead androids screaming around him and he could barely see or hear or even function as his thirium pump faltered and slowed.

“Toldja he’d be up here!”

Markus sat up, alarmed. Three figures approached him from across the deck, footsteps ringing faintly on the metal.

Simon, North, and Josh, two of which he would consider almost friends.

North smirked at Simon. “See? Maybe next time you’ll listen to me, huh?”

Simon rolled his eyes.

“Hey, what are you guys doing up here?” Markus asked, scrambling to his feet.

“Checking up on _you_ ,” Simon replied.

“Making sure you don’t do anything dumb,” added North.

“Oh, thanks . . .” Markus trailed off awkwardly.

The other three, almost in unison, settled next to him and leaned back. After a few seconds, he did the same.

The four of them stared up at the sky in silence for several minutes, dimly aware of each other’s presences and each lost in their own thoughts.

“Markus?” Simon asked to the left of him.

“Yeah?”

“I wasn’t too sure about coming out of hiding, but your speech . . . it changed my mind. I’m . . . I’m willing to stand up for our rights,” he admitted hesitantly.

“So am I,” North chimed in.

“Yeah . . . me too,” sighed Josh.

Markus felt a faint smile on his face for the first time since the junkyard. “Thanks, all of you.”

They lay there until the sun started rising.

Finally, Markus rose to his feet. “I’m gonna explore a bit of the city.”

“On your own? Are you sure?” Simon glanced at him, worried.

“I’ll be fine,” Markus reassured him, already walking away.

“Stay safe, Markus!” Simon called after him, waving.

 

He did stay safe.

For about a day at least, before he and the others invaded the Stratford tower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is where things are gonna get interesting . . . *evil laughter*  
> But never mind all that! Thanks for reading! <3


	3. The Stratford Tower

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Four go in. Three come out.

“They’re coming!” Simon cried, rearing back from the camera feed on the desk.

“Let’s go!” Markus called, his skin and hair reappearing on his body as he ducked away from the camera trained on his face.

The door opened for a SWAT team, who immediately opened fire. The androids hurled themselves behind the podium in the center of the room for cover.

As the SWAT team split to cover the exits, Simon tried to run for the stairs to the roof with Josh. He was shot instantly and fell to the ground.

“SIMON! They’re coming!” Markus yelled.

“I . . . I can’t, Markus!” Simon gasped, struggling to get to his feet. A burst of gunfire rang out, peppering the wall behind him with bullet holes. “Go without me!”

“Simon!” he shouted again, and raced across the room to help him up.

“What are you doing? Hurry!” North screamed, trying to cover them and their exit with just a pistol.

Markus slung Simon’s arm around his neck and hobbled forward as fast as he could with Simon’s weight leaning on him, ducking under another spray of bullets. Miraculously, they managed to get to the stairwell.

Markus reached behind him and slammed the door shut, granting them another precious few seconds. North and Josh helped the two of them struggle to the rooftop, where Simon collapsed against an old shipping container, unable to walk.

Thinking fast, North quickly closed the door and locked it with a quick hack.

Markus kneeled down next to Simon, concern etched in every wrinkle of his face.

“I can’t move my legs,” Simon rasped. Markus noticed a dark blue hole in his chest, torn through his shirt and just missing his thirium pump.

“Okay, don’t worry! We’re gonna get you back,” he reassured, ignoring the truth.

“They’re coming, Markus! We have to jump, now!” North warned.

Markus leapt up and walked a few feet away, thinking fast and trying not to panic. His internal sensors warned him that his processors were close to overheating.

“He won’t be able to make the jump,” Josh whispered hurriedly. “If they find him, they’ll access his memory, they’ll know everything.”

“We can’t leave him behind,” North said shakily. “We . . . we have to shoot him.”

“That’s murder!” Josh muttered furiously. “We can’t kill him! He’s one of us!”

“Markus, it’s your call,” North turned to him. “Remember the deal?”

“I won’t kill one of our own.” Markus shook his head.

“But the deal!” North hissed.

The deal. Before leaving to infiltrate the Stratford tower, the four of them had made a promise to each other: if one of them was captured or left behind, the others would kill them so Jericho could remain safe.

Markus hesitated and glanced at Simon. He was leaning against the wall of the shipping container, his blue eyes wide and scared, his LED solid red.

Before he really knew what he was doing, he was striding over to Simon and clasping one of his hands between his own.

“Simon . . . we gotta go. I’m sorry.”

Simon squeezed his hand weakly, as if already forgiving him. Markus pressed his pistol into his cold hands and stood up.

“Let’s go!” he ordered. The three of them grabbed parachutes from the bag and slammed them onto their shoulders. Simon squirmed and crawled behind the shipping container for cover.

Josh, Markus, and North started running for the edge of the roof.

The door crashed open. “Over there!”

They could hear heavy footsteps as the SWAT team rushed forward, gunfire booming sharply from behind them. Then they were leaping over the railing.

And then they were falling.

The buildings below were getting bigger and bigger at an alarming rate, the wind whistling in his ears, small snowflakes darting past and a few stinging against his eyes, forcing him to blink rapidly.

Markus pulled the cord and felt the parachute unfold from his back before his freefall was abruptly slowed by a sharp jerk that nearly sent him tumbling off course. The plan was to land in an alley between buildings and lose the police on the way back to Jericho.

Josh, in the lead, made a sharp turn to the right, and North and Markus both followed suit. He carefully led them into a shadowy alleyway between two tall buildings.

They shed their parachutes in the alley and began to run.

They ran and they ran and they ran. They dodged clumps of armed SWAT and avoided crowded areas. They ran and they ran and they ran, and finally they were home, climbing the walls of Jericho and slipping in through the holes in the deck.

Immediately, a cheer went up from the androids of Jericho, and they crowded around the trio, faces open and eager.

“We did it,” Josh announced. “We infiltrated the Stratford tower and sent a message to humanity!”

The mob whooped and yelled, excitement charging the very air. However, their elation was short-lived, as they quickly realized that four had left and only three had returned.

“We . . . had to leave Simon,” Markus’ voice cracked. “He got shot and he . . . he couldn’t escape with us.”

The androids pulled back silently, allowing him a clear path to walk through to get to one of the smaller rooms.

He needed to be alone.

Markus quietly closed the bulkhead door and slumped against it, closing his eyes. He just wanted to hide from the world and sleep his emotions away. This was one of the few moments he envied the humans. They could sleep for eight hours at a time, whereas he would wake out of rest mode automatically once the events of the day had been processed and stored in long-term memory.

He couldn’t stop replaying the rooftop in his mind.

Simon’s eyes, wide with fear and baby blue and boring into his soul. The way he squeezed his hand to reassure Markus even when he was wounded and being left behind. His hand, icy cold as his body recognized his wounds and tried to cut down on thirium consumption, as blue blood is an integral part to healing small gashes.

It was the eyes that bothered him the most. They stared into his own gaze with desperation, managing to communicate without words or mental connections.

And the way his expression went from fearful and panicked and desperate to almost relaxed, just by Markus taking his hand and telling him not to worry.

As if he trusted Markus with every wire in his body.

_He put his trust in the wrong person. I’m not gonna be able to save him. I’m not gonna be able to save him. I’m not gonna be able to save him. I’m not gonna -_

Markus growled to himself, and buried his face in his hands, trying to distract himself. _Just go into rest mode._

But he couldn’t tear his mind away from Simon’s eyes, the color of a chilly winter sky, and his cold hand gripping Markus’ and-

Markus shook his head to dispel the memories and slid all the way down the door so he was flat on the floor, staring up at the ceiling. He dove into his own coding and manually entered rest mode. He couldn’t deal with his own thoughts anymore.

 

The nightmares of course, were far worse.

_The door opened for a SWAT team, who immediately opened fire. The androids hurled themselves behind the podium in the center of the room for cover._

_As the SWAT team split to cover the exits, Simon tried to run for the stairs to the roof with Josh. He was shot instantly and fell to the ground._

_“SIMON! They’re coming!” Markus yelled._

_“I . . . I can’t, Markus!” Simon gasped, struggling to get to his feet. A burst of gunfire rang out, peppering the wall behind him with bullet holes. “Go without me!”_

_“Simon!” he shouted again, and raced across the room to help him up._

_“What are you doing? Hurry!” North screamed, trying to cover them and their exit with just a pistol._

_Markus slung Simon’s arm around his neck and hobbled forward as fast as he could with Simon’s weight leaning on him, ducking under another spray of bullets._

_But they didn’t make it to the stairwell. He felt Simon jerk against him and he slumped to the floor, slipping off Markus shoulders._

_“Simon? Simon!” Markus called futilely._

_He’d been shot, right in the thirium pump. He reached for Markus hand, grasping it weakly, desperately._

_“Run . . . run Markus . . .” he whispered._

_Markus felt tears pricking at his eyes._

_“They’ll destroy you, Markus. You gotta go,” he murmured. “Get outta here.”_

_Markus stood up, turned to run and-_

_The gunshot made his entire body ring. A blinding flash of light and a sound that deafened everything else. He collapsed into mud, shivering as rain hit his back,_

_He was in the junkyard again. He glanced around and to his horror saw familiar faces in the muck. Josh and North and Simon, permanently lost to the junkyard. Pleas for help were frozen on their faces, their hands clawing at the air despairingly._

_Markus took a step back, horrified, but he stepped directly into a wall full of hands, grabbing at him, tugging at his clothes, digging into his synthetic skin, pulling him back into the mud mountains of the junkyard. He reached out desperately, as if by clasping the air he could pull himself out. The hands push him deeper into the mud pile, he’s blind and deaf and mute and panic rises up in him, choking him. He’s afraid, he wants to live and see and hear and speak and love and he’s afraid and he’s going to die here._

 

Markus sat straight up and tumbled onto the floor in the fetal position, clutching at his chest. His thirium pump was going much too fast and it made him dizzy. His systems were close to overheating and he sucked in huge gulps of air to help cool his internal biocomponents.

After a few minutes of carefully regulating himself, everything normalized. He composed himself and opened the bulkhead door. He’s not quite ready to face the world, but it's better than his nightmares.

North and Josh both jumped up when he stepped out, faces soft with relief.

“Were . . . were you guys waiting for me?” Markus blinked, incredulous.

“Yeah. You were in there for three hours and twelve minutes.,” Josh murmurs. “We were starting to get worried.”

“Th-three hours?” Markus quickly checked the time. To his horror, Josh was right. He’d been in rest mode for about three times longer than usual, which was usually a sign of stress, grief, and being overwhelmed.

North peered at him with narrow eyes. “Markus? You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m just . . .” he trailed off. He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them there was new determination his gaze. “We need to get a search party out there for Simon. As soon as possible.”

Josh and North shared a glance.

“We can’t do that right now, Markus,” North said gently, almost apologetic. “It would be suicide.”

“There’s SWAT all over the city. They’re detaining random androids for questioning, and your eyes are a dead giveaway,” Josh explained. “She’s right.”

Markus closed his eyes again, fighting the wave of hopelessness. He had just gotten a friend, a companion, he couldn’t lose him so soon. “Then in a few days. We _will_ find him. No android left behind.”

Josh and North exchanged glances again.

“Alright,” Josh gave in easily. “In a couple days, we’ll look for him.”

North nodded slowly. “In a couple days.”

Markus bowed his head in disappointed agreement. “Alright.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did say things were gonna get interesting >:)  
> Thanks for reading! <3


	4. Reunited

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Connor conveniently interrogates the androids in the kitchen.

Simon crouched in the shipping container, rubbing one finger along the muzzle of the pistol nervously. He could hear investigators scraping around and talking outside, strangely distorted by the metal walls encasing him.

But finally, after a couple of hours of waiting and so desperately hoping they wouldn’t find him, he realized the outside was silent.

Carefully, he crept over the corrugated floor of the shipping container, his footsteps barely making a sound. He pushed open the door agonizingly slowly, wincing as it creaked loudly.

Simon poked his head out of the shipping container. The roof was abandoned and quiet, the freshly fallen snow marred by overlapping footsteps. The sky had cleared, allowing a golden sunset to sparkle on the snow and lend a warm hue to everything. The only noise was the faint whistle of the wind.

Simon felt a hesitant smile spread across his face. He was alive. And soon, he would be free. His circuits had reconnected the biocomponents in his legs, and he could move again, though not very well. He’d need real repairs soon.

He strolled to the imprint in the ground where the bag of chutes had been and his shoulders slumped with disappointment. Of course the investigators would have taken the evidence for further analysis. He shouldn’t have let his hopes up.

Simon sat cross-legged in the inch of snow and tried to think of a solution.

_What would Markus do?_

_Markus wouldn’t get himself into this situation in the first place, you moron._

Simon shook his head and tried to focus.

Markus would probably run into the building without fear, and get to the elevator in time and majestically charge out the doors into safety.

But Simon wasn’t sure he could do that.

He wasn’t sure he could escape at all.

If he didn’t find a way to escape, he’d have to hide forever so no one could find him and interrogate him and find the way to Jericho. That could be safer, actually. The idea was almost tempting

But then he thought about Markus’ warm hands clasping one of his own as he spoke, _“Simon . . . we gotta go. I’m sorry,”_. And the reluctance in his heterochromatic eyes, as if leaving Simon was tearing him apart.

Markus had broken the deal. He had broken the deal for Simon.

 _I_ **_have_ ** _to escape._

It looked like darting in and hopping into the elevator before anyone could stop him was his only option

Simon stood up and stared at the door that led to the conference room. A gateway that could either set him free or kill him.

He approached it, snow crunching under his feet, dread building with every step.

Simon opened the door a crack and peered in. The door at the bottom of the stairwell was open, and the conference room was empty, aside from a few determined investigators.

He steeled his nerves and crept down the stairs, pausing at the open doorway.

Then he began to sprint.

His damaged legs slowed him down to 80.8% of his normal speed, but it was still enough. He reached the elevator and hacked the doors to make them close faster. Investigators pounded their fists against the metal doors with metallic thumps.

Simon calmly selected the ground floor and hacked the elevator again so he could descend faster.

Within seconds, he was on the ground floor. The armed soldiers would still be halfway down the stairs.

The elevator door opened with a cheerful bing.

Simon saw the huge glass doors and raced towards them. A couple people shouted in his wake, and he could hear at least three people chasing him, clad in heavy combat boots from the sound of it.

“LOCK THE DOORS!” someone howled.

He deactivated the skin around his hand and extended his arm, ready to hack the doors. At full speed, he slammed the door open and continued running.

Out in the open now, he sprinted across the street and rushed into an alley. He rounded a corner and kept running and then another corner and he kept running and finally he lost them.

The biocomponents in his leg were becoming unstable. He had to get to Jericho, soon.

Simon quickly accessed an online GPS to pinpoint his location. If he moved now, he would get to Jericho before the sun was below the horizon.

He started walking.

Then he remembered how worried Markus looked when they had to leave him, and started running.

 

Simon strode across Jericho, eager to rejoin his friends. Then they can all talk about what happened in his absence, and maybe he can get his legs fixed, and they’d make him feel better after all that had happened.

He paused when he saw Markus approaching him from a side hall, eyes downcast, looking at the floor without really seeing it.

Markus looked up at the sound of footsteps and stopped in place.

They stared at each other for a moment. Markus looked Simon up and down, brows furrowed as he observed all his injuries.

Simon opened his mouth and closed it again.

Markus took a couple steps closer, as if afraid he’d disappear if he got to close. Then a genuine smile broke through and he pulled Simon into a firm hug.

They stayed like that, in each other’s embrace for somewhere between a second and an eternity. Simon felt warm and safe, as if the tension of the day was draining away.

Finally, Markus pulled back, his hands on Simon’s shoulders. “I . . . I thought you weren’t gonna make it back.”

Simon realized he couldn’t keep the smile off his face. He nodded, unable to speak.

“I’m . . . I’m _so_ sorry,” Markus whispered. He stepped back, arms falling to his sides, and looked away. “We just . . . _left_ you there and - and -”

Simon interrupted him with another hug. He felt Markus hesitantly reciprocate.

“It’s okay,” he murmured. “It’s okay. You could have just - you were _supposed_ to kill me, and you didn’t.”

“But-”

“I don’t blame you for leaving me, Markus. If you hadn’t, we’d all be dead.” Simon said sternly, taking a step backwards.

Markus nodded, lashes wet. “How’d you escape?” he asked, voice still thick.

Simon grinned. “Where are the others? I want them to hear this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Simon being lowkey thirsty for Markus and being in denial gives me l i f e  
> Thanks for reading! <3


	5. Rest Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Jericrew gets a well-deserved break day.
> 
> They also try to launch a merry-go-round into space.

“We need a break,” Josh groaned. “We’ve raided two places in . . . what was it? Three days?”

“I never thought I’d say this, but Josh is right,” North agreed.

Simon nodded as well. “I’d like to spend some time with you guys before we risk our lives again.”

Markus stared at them for several seconds before bowing his head in agreement. “What should we do then?”

“Well, before you came here, we just sat around all day, talking occasionally, maybe going outside sometimes, but mostly we just huddled around Jericho and tried to ignore the outside world,” Simon offered. “But . . . now that I’ve gotten a taste of what it feels like to fight back . . . I don’t want to do that any longer.”

Markus thought for a moment, and an idea struck him. “Why don’t we go out on the town? We could explore, maybe put up some graffiti for our cause, get some new clothes so they don’t recognize us . . .” he trailed off as the other three stared at him blankly.

“That _is_ a good idea . . .” Josh mused.

“I’m in. Let’s do it!” North whooped.

“Wait, I want to do it, but . . . our LEDs,” Simon pointed out, almost apologetically.

“We can just them take them out,” North dismissed.

Both Simon and Josh flinched.

“I’m not ready to do that yet . . .” Simon murmured. Josh just shook his head.

“We can cover them with hats. It’s cold enough to justify them, and we have some in a bin somewhere, don’t we?” suggested Markus.

 

A few minutes later, the four of them were standing outside Jericho, armed with beanies worn low to cover the rings of light at their temples, and unsure of what to do next.

“Markus, we don’t have any money. How are we going to afford new clothes or spray paint or . . . anything, really? We can’t steal it,” Simon asked, rubbing his hands together nervously.

“Yes, we can!” North protested.

“No, Simon is right,” Markus cut her off before she could say more. “If they find out we’re androids, or if they recognize our faces, it’ll ruin the whole pacifist image we have.”

“Then what _can_ we do?” North retorted.

Markus smiled faintly. “We _do_ have some money . . .”

The other three immediately began to pester him, asking how and where and why.

He didn’t answer, much to their annoyance.

 

About an hour later, they were purchasing spray paint in new clothes from a thrift store.

“What’re we gonna do with these?” Simon asked.

Markus shoved the cans into his new backpack. “We’re gonna show what we _really_ think, all over the buildings and structures of Detroit.”

Their first stop was under a small bridge. A quick scan proved there were no humans about that might see them.

Markus quickly downloaded a guide to spray art, committed it to memory, and pulled the colors black, dark blue, light blue, white, and vibrant red from his backpack.

He closed his eyes and reached out to drag his fingers across the rough cement, memorizing his canvas, as well as the distance between him and it. Focusing deep within his coding, he placed the cement support pillar in an imaginary 3D plane, so he could perfectly see his painting without opening his eyes.

Reaching down, he grabbed a can he knew was white, shook the can, and began to paint.

A flat, white plain, with a light blue sky. On the horizon, two dark blue silhouettes were holding hands and leaning towards each other. They were shrinking back from the red figures which flowed upward from the bottom of the artwork and were slowly marching toward them, clutching black weapons with dark blue tips as if stained by blue blood.

He stepped away from the pillar and opened his eyes, discarding the 3D simulation in his head.

It wasn’t perfect to his mental image, but it conveyed everything it needed to convey.

He turned around to discover the other three androids staring open-mouthed at it.

“Markus, that’s . . . incredible,” Simon breathed.

He bobbed his head in thanks and tossed the cans back into his backpack. “Let’s hit the next location.”

“Wait!” Josh exclaimed. “You - you should sign it. So our people know it’s ours, and it’ll give them hope.”

“What should I sign it? It has to be something that androids specifically know, or it won’t do anything good. Just my name won’t work,” Markus pointed out.

“Sign it ‘rA9’.” North whispered.

Markus hesitated, then tugged the red spray from his backpack and carefully, in CyberLife Sans, painted a small “rA9” in the corner.

“Who is rA9?” Markus inquired, shouldering his backpack and tightening the straps.

“A legend,” North murmured in a low tone. “Just a legend.”

Markus narrowed his eyes but let it slide. “C’mon, there’s a few more places I want to paint.”

He did four works in all, the one under the bridge, one on the support pillar of a skytrain, and two in separate alleyways.

The skytrain artwork showed blue figures clutching at the bars of silver cages, locked within. Outside, red silhouettes swirling with black jeered and pointed at them mockingly.

One of the alley paintings exhibited two purple hands clasping each other in a handshake. Their wrists swirled with galaxies, and the place where they touched exuded a golden aura, sparkling with silver, copper, and bronze.

The other alley work displayed an army of gray and white people, outlined in blue. Each one had different facial features, sprayed in excruciating detail. All of them were raising their hands in a fist against a red sky, and around their wrists broken shackles fluttered.

Every piece of artwork was signed in a corner, in perfect CyberLife Sans, with the name “rA9”.

After the fourth painting, they heard sirens nearby and fled. Josh insisted they lay low for the rest of the day, much to the others disappointment. Eventually, they each gave in, but none of them wanted to go back to their dingy, rusting old home.

So, Simon suggested they hang out at a park or something and enjoy the outside air, and they all agreed.

 

“Guys! Help!” Josh cried. North was chasing him around the playground equipment with an evil grin.

Simon and Markus looked at each other, nodded, and returned their respective gazes to the others.

“Nope,” Markus replied.

“Not a chance,” agreed Simon.

The sun was setting and the children at the playground had all left. There was a wonderful atmosphere of freedom and endlessness and immortality all around them, like the night would last forever and they could do anything.

Josh leapt through the merry-go-round, making it rotate slightly with a squeak. North careened around it, still chasing him, and gaining on him. Josh shrieked with fear and ducked underneath the equipment, dodging around metal poles and hopping over slides.

“GUYS!” he pleaded.

“It was your fault for provoking her,” Markus pointed out.

“Yeah, don’t drag us into this!” Simon retorted, apparently of the same mind. Then Simon turned to Markus, a hesitant grin on his face. “While they’re off killing each other, wanna try the merry-go-round?”

Markus shrugged. “Why not?”

They hopped down from the equipment, landing on the soft, rubbery material below, and strode over. It was the kind with a bunch of rails to grip around a central, table-like raised disk used for spinning.

After much experimenting, CyberLife found that the easiest way for androids to have an idea of balance, was the same way humans do, with fluids in the ear. Otherwise, they started running into issues with any kind of slope.

This of course, meant that androids could also get dizzy from spinning.

“Oh . . . I feel like I’m flying through space . . .” Simon murmured, cheek against the metal disk in the middle, eyes closed.

“Bet we can go faster!” Markus laughed. It felt _amazing_ to laugh again. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed since the junkyard.

“Nooo . . .” Simon giggled. Markus sat up and grasped the sides of the disk to start them spinning again.

The merry-go-round shuddered and bounced as two more people leapt on while it was spinning. Josh and North, joining in. North immediately reached over and helped Markus accelerate them.

They whooped and cheered as they spun faster and faster.

However, androids are far faster than humans and don’t tire. And the merry-go-round really wasn’t built for that.

“Agh!” Josh yowled, the centrifugal force tugging him backwards. He gripped the outermost ring of bars desperately, feet flying out behind him and soaring about a foot over the ground.

“Josh!” yelped Markus, reaching out for him with an unsteady hand, but laughing too hard to do more than . . . well, laugh.

The merry-go-round started tipping back and forth alarmingly. It was going so fast it wasn’t perfectly balanced anymore.

“ABORT! ABORT!” Simon howled. He drunkenly stood up and _jumped_ over the railings, straight off the ride. North artfully backflipped off the merry-go-round. Josh simply let go and let himself fly off.

Markus gracefully dolphin-dived off the merry-go-round and rolled with the impact as he hit the ground. “Everyone alive?”

“Unfortunately,” North groaned.

“Barely,” Josh spat grass from his mouth.

“Somehow,” Simon moaned.

Markus turned to look at the ride, creaking and rattling as it slowed down and settled back on its bearings. He felt a huge wave of mirth rise up within him and then he was on the ground, laughing so hard his internal systems were giving him error messages. He was dimly aware of the others looking at him and starting to laugh as well, but he barely registered the fact.

It was like all the suffering he’d endured since the incident with Leo was coming back as happiness.

He laughed until tears were streaming down his cheeks and - seriously, he _had_ to breathe _now_ before his internal biocomponents overheated - but still he lay on the ground, gasping for air as warnings piled up in the back of his mind.

Finally, he sat up, still sort of giggling and coughing, and took several deep breaths.

Around him, the others were smiling and wiping their eyes.

Markus took in his environment, surprised by how dark it was. They must not have noticed the sun gradually disappearing. The sky was velvety dark, and the streetlights were all on, sharply illuminating the streets.

“I suppose we should head back,” he sighed.

The other three seemed disappointed as well.

“Can’t we stay out a little longer?” Simon pleaded.

Markus looked up at him, already compiling a list of reasons on why no, they couldn’t, but Simon’s eyes were wide and baby-blue and desperate and he found himself saying the words before he could stop himself.

“Fine.”

The blonde android’s face lit up.

North leaned over and poked him in the shoulder. “Tag.”

In a few seconds, Simon found himself alone in an empty park, as the others had fled in all different directions.

They tagged each other through the city streets, all the way back to Jericho.

Finally, they collapsed onto a pile of crates within the ship, laughing and talking eagerly.

“That was awesome!” Simon gushed. “We need to do that more often!”

The other three nodded in agreement.

Markus yawned, eyelids fluttering. “I’m exhausted. Wake me if you need anything.”

He rolled off the crates and walked to his little “room”, the place where he’d slept while worrying about Simon. Without closing the door, he curled up in a corner of the room and sank into rest mode instantly.

Amazingly, he didn’t have any nightmares.

 

Around 1:00 am, he woke up and heard faint voices outside his room. He stretched and strolled outside.

North, Josh, and Simon were gathered around a TV screen, watching a human reporter drone on about the “terrorist attack” on the Stratford tower.

“Our broadcast is all over the news,” Josh announced, glancing at Markus. “Now humans know.”

“They’re still talking about that? That was a full day ago,” Markus noted.

“It was a mistake to reach out to them.” North shook her head. “They’ll never negotiate with their slaves. We should have shown we were prepared to fight.”

“Violence is never the answer,” Josh protested. “Dialogue is the only way.”

Simon stopped them before they could really start arguing. “Hey! Cut it out!”

They settled back down, eyes still narrowed at each other.

“What do we do now?” Simon finally said.

All of three of them turned to Markus, faces open and eager.

Markus smiled. He had a plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hmmmm I'm not very happy with this chapter and I don't know why? Like I like the friendship bonding and the ending is okay but it just feel slightly . . . off to me. I dunno I might rewrite it later
> 
> Next chapter should be interesting though I'm looking forward to it! Thanks for reading! <3


	6. Capitol Park

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Markus and Simon free some androids from a CyberLife store. Should be pretty straightforward.
> 
> But when dealing with Simon, nothing is ever straight.

In a snowy alleyway with a tall fence across its mouth, a manhole cover mysteriously bounced once and slid open.

Markus crept out first, followed by Simon.

Simon opened the chain-link gate and quietly closed it behind them. They trotted through another alley, silent and wary.

Police sirens broke the air in a street near them, and Simon roughly grabbed Markus’ arm to throw him behind a dumpster. He slid in after Markus, brows furrowed with worry. There wasn’t very much space behind the dumpster so they were packed together like sardines.

The cruiser rolled past them, tires squeaking on the newly fallen snow. They both shrunk down as the flashing red and blue lights lit up their small hiding place.

The police car turned right and disappeared from view.

“They’re gone,” Simon murmured, crawling out of the space.

“There’s probably even more police in the area,” Markus noted. “We should be careful.”

They jogged over the pavement, reaching the store in a matter of moments.

Markus cast a quick scan over the area, and identified several androids. He retracted the skin around his hand, turning it shiny porcelain white, and laid it on a worker’s shoulder.

He sent a ripple of emotion through the connection, fear, desperation, happiness, contentment, anger, sorrow, as well as flashes of memories, painting something of his own, something  _ he _ created, with Carl; hugging Simon when he came back and never wanting to let go; infiltrating the Stratford tower.

The android blinked and pulled away, LED flickering red.

“You’re free,” Markus whispered, and took a step back.

Simon stared in wonder as Markus darted around Capitol Park, converting everyone he could lay his hands on.

He trotted back to Simon, who was waiting near the doors.

Markus stared into the store, at his own people being sold like toys. It was time to make a difference.

“Let’s get them out,” Simon said from behind Markus.

He turned around to face him and was surprised to see the determination on Simon’s face. He didn’t expect the generally gentle android to be capable of such serious emotion.

“Remember the plan, we neutralize the alarm systems and secure the area. We have,” Markus checked his internal clock, “Ten minutes and sixteen seconds until all our teams attack.”

Simon nodded once. “Let’s do it.”

Markus leaned forward, scanning the interior of the CyberLife store. He picked up on several models, backburner programs immediately identifying their model, model line, and primary uses.

He also picked up on a security camera in the ceiling. He focused on it, analyzing it, and quickly found its system signature. “Found it,” he whispered.

He tagged everything with that signature red so he could see where the line went, and followed it across the street to a pit in the ground that had been fenced off with striped orange and white barricades. The network line went through a metal pipe with a cluster of other lines, a pipe that androids were in fact currently working on.

Markus ducked down as a security drone whizzed by overhead, illuminating half his body with its searchlight, but miraculously, not targeting him.

He decided to take care of that first.

Markus analyzed the drone in a matter of microseconds and quickly calculated its flight path to find the best place to attack it. Leaping from the scaffolding seemed to be his best bet.

Taking a step back, he preconstructed his path, processors whirring. Leap up to the second bar, from that, jump up and to the left, clambering up onto the wooden platform, turning around, and lunging for the drone.

He sprinted forward, using his momentum to carry himself to the second bar, and effortlessly acted out the preconstructed method. The drone neared him right on time as he lunged out into open air to grab it.

He gripped the plastic wings, trying to rip the drone apart, but this one was made of tougher stuff than the one at the docks. The searchlight began flashing red just before he finally managed to tear one of the sections half-off, and slammed it into the ground with a satisfying crunch.

“I hope it didn’t have time to call the cops,” Simon worried.

“We’ll soon find out,” Markus said. If it had, there wasn’t much they could do.

Markus glanced back at the exposed network line and began to cross the street when he glimpsed red and blue flashes coming from the left.

He froze, his mind automatically calculating how long they had before the cruiser turned onto their street and saw them.

Nineteen seconds.

_ Act natural. _

Markus whirled around and pulled Simon into the bus stop shelter. He grasped him roughly by the shoulders and pushed him up against the wall, glancing up to see how close the cop car was - it was almost upon them - and pressed his lips to Simon’s.

And Markus suddenly understood why humans got so excited about it.

It felt . . . amazing. Someone else’s lips against his, soft and - wow, Simon was  _ distractingly  _ warm - and the way the rest of the world dissolved so it was just them, and Simon’s hands sliding slowly from his shoulders to his elbows, and a storm of new feelings, new sensations.

Markus was barely aware of the cruiser’s location relative to them, but one of the programs in the back of his mind was quick to alert him that the danger was past. For a second, he was tempted to stay there, testing out all these new phenomena and analyzing his own reactions to them, but then common sense regained control and he pulled away.

Simon looked up at him, baby-blue eyes half-lidded between closed-to-seem- convincing and flaring wide with shock, and mouth half-open from the kiss. His hands were still clutching at Markus’ arms but they fell to his sides as Markus took a step back. Was he imagining things or were Simon’s cheeks slightly flushed?

He had the feeling that image would be at the forefront of his storage drives for a while.

“Sorry!” Markus said quickly. “The cop car was right there - it was the only thing we could do so they wouldn’t suspect us!”

“It’s fine,” Simon murmured quietly. “I know why you did it.”

Markus nodded and turned his attention back to the security network. There were  _ plenty _ of new emotions that needed to be processed, but they didn’t have the time. He’d manually process some later before going into rest mode. For now, he’d have to ignore them, distracting as they were.

He leapt into the square pit, landing with a crunch on small, round pebbles of dirt. He extended a hand to the two android workers there, freeing them both and motioning them aside to give him access to the pipe.

The skin around his hand vanished, and he gripped the network line to interface with it.

An uncomfortably large amount of data from the security cameras poured into his head. He gritted his teeth and managed to pierce deeper into the alarm system, forcing its coding to his will. Within a few seconds of concentration, he created an interloop within the system. The cameras would repeat the last ten seconds of footage endlessly, and the alarms would keep trying to alert themselves rather than the police.

Markus clambered out of the pit and surveyed Capitol Park.

“Good job, Markus!” Simon congratulated him warmly, earning a small smile. The sight of him brought back those new feelings that needed to be processed. That was mildly concerning.

“There’s traffic on the road,” Markus observed as a small white car rolled by. “We need to block it.”

“It’s a one-way, shouldn’t be too bad,” Simon added hopefully.

Markus jogged to the other end of the block, Simon trailing behind. There was a large electric sign with the words “CONSTRUCTION WORK AHEAD - SLOW DOWN” resting on the sidewalk.

Simon darted over and helped Markus drag the sign into the middle of the road. He slapped the screen with a glossy white hand, scrambling the lights for a moment before they congealed back into coherent text.

“ROAD CLOSED”.

“Looks like the plaza’s secure,” Markus announced. “Now we can get inside the store.”

On the large expanse of sidewalk, there was an uneven circle of chain-link fence lined with plastic banners. He knelt down and peered through a gap in the plastic to see an immense truck, perfect for ramming the store.

He stepped back and tugged on the gate to no avail; a fat padlock the size of his palm was clipped around the top.

“Ah. I got it,” Simon smiled, pulling what looked like two long metal toothpicks on a ring from his pocket. Upon further inspection, it was a lockpick and something Markus’ databases identified as a “tension wrench”.

Simon fiddled with the padlock for a moment, eyes closed, deep in concentration. After a few minutes, the lock clicked and fell to the ground with a clatter.

“Got it,” Simon breathed with satisfaction. He pulled the gate open and gestured Markus forward with an almost-smirk. “After you.”

Markus patted Simon’s shoulder appreciatively and slipped in as Simon began sliding the telescoping gate all the way back into place. He placed a hand on the palm-reader of the truck and hacked it to allow him access.

They both hopped in and slammed the doors shut.

Simon grinned giddily. “Ready?”

Markus didn’t answer, focusing on carefully maneuvering the large truck out of its containment without running into anything. He turned right and drove just far enough that both sets of tires were on the sidewalk, while still giving them plenty of room to accelerate to top speed.

He hesitated, mentally preparing himself for what they were about to do. The enormity of the situation crashed down on him, and his limbs rippled with warmth as his body primed his muscles with thirium, as if preparing for what’s to come.

“Ready?” he said with a sly glance at Simon.

“Always,” Simon replied, a little breathlessly.

Markus gunned it.

The face of the CyberLife store was rapidly expanding as they got closer and closer, still accelerating - then they hit the glass with an incredible noise - the truck didn’t even slow down - and Markus slammed on the brakes.

They screeched to a halt a few feet before an android on a pedestal.

“Let’s do this,” Simon smiled, hopping out. Markus slipped out of the truck and removed the skin from his hand, revealing the porcelain white underneath.

He reached for an android’s wrist.

 

A few minutes later, they were all free, milling about aimlessly, confused and scared.

Markus leapt onto a desk in the middle of the store. They needed a place to go. They needed Jericho. And that was something he could give them.

A couple glanced up at him, gazes immediately attracted to the harsh movement.

“My name is Markus,” he began, “and just like you, I was a slave. An object, designed to obey them. But then I chose to open my eyes, to take back my freedom, and decide who I wanted to be.

“Now, I have come to tell you, that  _ you _ can be your own masters. I’ve come to tell you that you don’t have to obey them anymore. From this day forward, you can walk with your heads held high, you can take your destiny in your hands.

“Jericho, is a place for those of us who  _ want  _ freedom. Now sure, you can stay here, and continue to serve them. . . . Or you can come with us, and fight by our side. You’re free now. It’s up to you to decide.”

The crowd of androids stared at him for a silent, tense moment.

“I’m with you,” someone called from the back.

Then another. “We’re with you!”

“I’ll follow you, Markus!”

Then all of them,  _ all of them _ , cheering wildly. 

An incredible feeling of power swept over him. He could do anything, and they’d do the same.

“Then follow me!” he called, jumping down from the desk.

“Markus, what’re you doing?” Simon asked nervously.

“I’m gonna send the humans a message,” he explained, an ominous note in his tone.

He pulled a holo-tagger from his backpack, and selected the symbol he wanted to represent the cause, “painting” it on a window.

“They’ll do whatever you do, Markus. Choose your message wisely,” Simon whispered.

Markus nodded. “I know.”

They transformed all of Capitol Park.

They left slogans and symbols glowing on park benches, windows, the sides of buildings. They moved cars and hacked temporary android storages as well as the bus stop, so their screens displayed clips of Markus’ speech from the Stratford tower. Markus hacked the massive display on the front of the CyberLife store so it too was relaying his speech.

He was placing a holo-flag into the top of a little gazebo-type thing, when Simon called for him.

“Markus! Look!” he was pointing at the building across the street. “We could climb to the top and put in some spike projectors . . .” he trailed off.

Markus nodded wordlessly and slipped off the roof, quickly calculating a way up the building. It was stylized heavily, and should be easy to climb. He scaled it easily and glanced over to see Simon surpassing the edge to stand next to him.

They raised their spikes in unison and plunged them into the cement material below. The spike projector crackled and buzzed as they came to life, displaying their symbol at gargantuan proportions across the entire front of the building.

Finally, Markus turned in a slow circle to admire their work. He paused mid-spin as Josh reported back to him.

**“We freed hundreds of our people. We did it!”** he said excitedly, voice echoing from within Markus’ mind.

Markus didn’t have time to send an affirmative. He could hear approaching sirens. 

They’d been discovered.

Markus extended the reach of his artificial telepathy, tapping into the circuits of every android in Capitol Park.  **“Everyone fall back to Jericho.”**

As one, the gathered androids dropped their holo-taggers and stopped pushing cars. They began to sprint down the road as Markus uploaded the GPS location of the old freighter into their minds.

Simon appeared next to him. “We did well tonight, Markus.”

Markus glanced at his satisfied smile and found his own lips curving upward at the corners. For a split second, it was just him and Simon, smiling at each other, blissfully happy in their recent triumph.

Then Simon squeezed his shoulder encouragingly, and turned to run with the others.

Markus watched him go, waiting to make sure the rest of his people had escaped before bringing up the rear. He really needed to process those emotions as soon as possible.

Three police drones whizzed by, illuminating his face in harsh white light.

Markus stared at them as they soared onward, brows furrowing with concern.

Then, in the distance, “This way! FIRE!”

Several gunshots sounded off a rapport, followed by android screams.

“Simon!” Markus called, breaking into a run.

He rounded a corner and was horrified to see numerous androids collapsed in the street, blue blood pooling around them. Farther down the street, a mass of androids was crowded around the flashing lights of a police cruiser. He’d check out that situation next, first he needed to attend to Simon.

He was kneeling next to the corpse of an android, shoulders slumped, baby-blue eyes downcast. Snowflakes caught in his blonde hair, a sight that Markus’ databases compared to constellations in the night sky.

Markus skidded to a stop and knelt next to him. “Simon, you alright? What happened?” he grabbed his arm, hoping the physical contact would offer some comfort. He shook him gently. “Simon!”

“They - they killed them! I thought - how could they -” Simon stuttered. He turned to face Markus, cheeks glistening with tears. “Like - like animals - they killed us like animals -”

“Hey, hey!” Markus ducked his head to meet Simon’s gaze, which was fixated on the snowy road. “Who did?”

Simon closed his eyes and shook his head. Suddenly, he was gripping Markus’ arm like it was his lifeline. Perhaps it was.

“Who?” Markus pressed.

Simon opened his eyes and with a broken, bruised voice, he whispered, “ _ Them _ .”

Markus stood up, leaving Simon to stare at the corpse in despair. He’d offer moral support later, right now he had to deal with the crowd of androids between him and the cop car.

The masses parted before him to reveal two officers in front of their own car, on their knees with their hands behind their heads.

“They killed our people, Markus,” one android hissed.

“We want justice, Markus!” another spat.

“They have to pay!” yet another.

An AP700 handed a pistol to him. He leveled it at one of the officers, conflicted. Instinct and his thirst for vengeance told him to pull the trigger, but his deep repulsion of violence - not to mention the fact his databases were involuntarily pulling up memories of Carl’s face - kept him from doing so.

“You don’t have to do this,” the officer choked. “No . . . please! Please!”

He was crying, his cheeks shiny with tears, ragged sobs stuttering from his throat.

Markus lowered the pistol, feeling the others start to resent him immediately.

“An eye for an eye, and the world goes blind,” he whispered, audible only to himself. He addressed the officers. “We won’t punish a crime with another crime.”

He shoved the gun back at the AP700 and stalked away, feeling their gazes burning on his back.

He walked all the way back to the little fenced-off corner from which they came. Not once turning around to face the others, not once opening his mouth to explain his actions. He kept at his steady plod until he had walked through the sewers, through part of the city, all the way to Jericho. And then he kept walking until he reached his little “room”, where he put his back to the wall farthest from the door and slid down it, drawing his knees up to his chest, and put his head in his hands.

He didn’t want to answer anyone’s questions about his decision. He certainly didn’t want to explain it to North, who’d be livid when she found out. He didn’t really want to talk to anyone.

That wasn’t true.

There was one person, a person he rather greatly wished he could talk to.

His databases quickly pulled up a clinical definition for the feeling of missing someone, followed immediately by several memories.

He missed Carl.

He missed the room Carl designated to him, filled with paintings and trinkets he’d collected while running errands. A long, gray feather from a pigeon’s wing, the blossom of a thistle, a photo of the family that had asked him in the middle of the sidewalk if he could take a picture of them for their scrapbook, to name a few.

He missed waking Carl up in the mornings, and listening to him talk and talk and talk about art, wisdom, philosophy, life, death. He’d taught Markus how to play piano and chess, and he’d read Shakespeare and Tolkien aloud to him on quiet days.

He missed the feeling of making breakfast, he missed his own bed, but most of all he missed Carl.

If Carl was here, he would tell Markus what to do next. He would reassure him that he’d made the right decision, that he was doing the right thing. He would tell him that everything would be okay.

And Markus would believe him.

 

Light, hesitant footsteps broke Markus out of his reverie. He realized he was crying and swiped at his eyes before looking up.

Simon was leaning on the doorframe, expression open and desperate.

“What do you-” Markus’ voice cracked and he cleared his throat impatiently. “What’s up?”

Simon didn’t answer, choosing instead to gaze at the floor intently. Markus glanced down out of curiosity. The floor wasn’t  _ that _ interesting.

“Simon?” he tried.

Simon shuffled into the room and sat next to him, close enough that Markus’ external sensors could pick up on his body heat.

“Why,” he whispered. “Why would they do that to us?”

Markus slumped. “I . . . I don’t know.”

Simon whimpered and then his arms were snaking around Markus’ middle and he was pulling him into a hug.

He leaned into Simon and returned the embrace.

Markus concluded that he liked hugs. It was nice having someone else pressed against him, warm and soft and decidedly reassuring. 

They stayed like that for thirty-one minutes and twelve seconds. Both of them were silently crying into the other’s shoulder, and both of them knew it.

They felt safe in the other’s embrace. Neither of them wanted to move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hooooo boy this was fun to write! Sorry it took so long, I was having a ton of writer's block and just 0 motivation or inspiration and then at like 1:30 am, I suddenly regained all my skill and motivation. I'm REALLY proud of the last half of this chapter because I was in the ZONE while writing it!
> 
> So, I was doing research on the wiki to see the flowchart for this chapter. And if you fall off the drone instead of destroying it, North destroys it, and then a police car comes along and you have the option to ACT NATURAL AND FEIGN A KISS WITH NORTH. I saw that and K N E W I had to put it in!
> 
> As always, thanks for reading! All the nice comments are making my day! <<<<3


	7. Alone Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Markus is feeling conflicted over his latest decision as the unspoken leader of Jericho. He finds a little place to be alone and think, but Simon finds him regardless.
> 
> He ends up discovering a lot about Simon.

There was an old brick building by Jericho. The windows were punched in, and the roof was collapsing in on the top floor. It would have been signed for demolition long ago if anyone knew, or cared, about it.

Markus was standing in one of the rooms on the top floor. The ceiling that was supposed to be above him had long since caved in, and the outer wall had crumbled, allowing the sky to peer in on two faces of the room. Snow carpeted the floor below. He kicked a stray magazine away, wondering idly how it ended up there. 

There was a plank protruding from the edge of the building, leading a few yards out into the sky. He walked along it cautiously, taking narrow steps so he didn’t fall off, and carefully sat down on the end. 

It felt like he was floating, only one skinny plank tethering him to reality. Detroit was spread out below and before him, snowy streets far below him, the sky wide and encapsulating above him.

Just him and a silent world. Good for thinking.

And god, he needed to think.

He needed to manually process those weird new emotions he’d had since the fake kiss with Simon, he needed to decide what to do next, he needed to get away from everyone else and their judgemental gazes, asking him why he didn’t shoot those policemen, how could he betray his own people like that, why why why -

“So this is where you ran off to.”

A gentle, teasing tone pulled Markus back into the real world, shattering the intrusive thoughts.  _ Simon. _

“I needed some time to myself. Time to think,” Markus murmured.

“Hm. It’s funny that you came here, of all places. North, Josh, and me, we all come here too, when we need to be alone. It’s like . . . being alone with the world.”

Markus stood up and turned around carefully. Simon was standing next to the edge of the building, tired but oddly . . . hopeful?

He walked slowly back onto the solid floor and collapsed into a dusty chair.

“We freed hundreds, you know. And they’re still coming from all over the city.” Simon offered. His expression becomes concerned. “You seem . . . preoccupied.”

“They all obey me, they follow me without question . . . and that much power feels good . . . and scary.” he looks away, feeling the weight of all his actions on his shoulders. “At . . . at the same time.”

“All the media is talking about what we did last night. The humans are talking, some terrified of civil war, some . . . some are on our side. And many of our people were caught in the crossfire last night.” Simon’s tone darkened for a moment, but then there was a smile in his voice. “But . . . I trust you. I think . . . I think you know what’s right for our people, and I think we’ll succeed. Because of you.”

Markus looked up at him. “Thank you. That . . . that helps.”

“You know, you haven’t said much about yourself since you joined us.” Simon walked closer. “What was it like, your life before Jericho?”

Markus stood up from his chair and took a half-step to stand on the edge of the building. He stared at the city for a few moments before speaking.

“I was caring for an old man; he was like a father to me. He showed me that humans and androids  _ can _ live together. I . . . I miss him.”

Even saying that prompted a flurry of self-doubt.  _ What if Carl was just pretending? How can I miss a human? Is that a betrayal to my own people? What if what if what if- _

Markus closed his eyes and carefully silenced those thoughts. He turned to Simon. “What about you? You never told me about your past, what did you do before?”

Simon’s shoulders raised slightly, his eyes narrowing just a hair. “I haven’t . . . told anyone about it . . .”

“We have to know things about each other to trust each other,” Markus pointed out gently.

Simon closed his eyes. His LED was solid red.

“I . . . I . . . I fell . . . for my owner . . . F-fell in love, I mean.” he spoke hesitantly, quietly, just above a whisper. “He was a single dad . . . b-but he had a friend and she was toxic to him . . .  _ to the kids _ .” there was venom in his voice. “And one day she . . . she hit him . . . and I - I had to fight back. So I pulled her away from him and I . . . I killed her, Markus. I killed her.”

Tears were streaming down his cheeks. He took a step away from Markus. “I-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have told you.”

Markus stepped closer to him, almost touching each other. He pressed his palm to Simon’s, the skin on his hand receding to reveal white, and sent a prompt to interface.

Simon accepted the prompt hesitantly and-

 

_ There was a man - Jesse - he had tanned skin and warm green eyes and a shadow of stubble along his jaw and he was always smiling. He was the sunlight shining through green leaves and squares of milk chocolate and thick honey and the smell of real books, paper and leather, and light coming between the cracks of a closed door to do some late-night work. _

_ Jesse was always smiling at Simon and Simon was always smiling back. So much love, so much emotion. Simon always thought Jesse loved him back _

_ They lived a good life, tinted gold and green. _

_ And then she was in the study, hitting him again and again, screaming at him. _

_ And then Simon was free. _

_ Simon grabbed her around the waist and pulled her back. He flung her to the ground and stomped on her throat again and again and again - _

_ She’s dead. She’s dead she’s dead she’s dead she’s dead - _

 

They both leapt back at the same time, skin returning to their hands. Markus felt as if he just downloaded a terabyte of Simon’s memories. It wasn’t a full terabyte of course, but such a large amount of data pouring into his head in such a short amount of time was . . . almost painful.

“I . . . I saw your memories . . .” Simon breathed. “Carl’s house. When they left you for dead in that studio . . . and . . . that . . .  _ place _ .”

“I saw yours too . . . his house . . . her - her death, I felt like I was there with you.” Markus shook his head slowly.

“I - I’m sorry - I need - I need some time - sorry -” Simon backed away and turned to run.

“Simon!”

He was already gone.

Markus stared after him, processors whirring. Interfacing was . . . an intimate exchange. He was honestly amazed that Simon let him in with such little hesitance. And the  _ emotion _ that Simon felt, there was  _ so much _ .

But the main thing he was concerned about was the new emotions he’d had since that fake kiss. They’d flared up tenfold when he interfaced with Simon.

He sat cross-legged in the thin white carpet of snow and closed his eyes. It was time he manually processed the feelings that had been nagging at him.

_ Wanting to kiss him again, not wanting to stop kissing him in the first place, the feel of his hand clasping Markus’, big, soulful eyes the color of a winter sky, they reminded him of #AEC6E2, the way his scripts stuttered when Simon hugged him after the Capitol Park incident, the way just seeing his face made his programs speed up- _

Markus whimpered quietly as more emotions flooded his mind. Processing them had caused what felt like a thousand new ones to rise. There were so many, they were all so strong, it was almost too much.

He gritted his teeth, eyes scrunched shut, and fought through the torrent. He needed to know. He needed to understand.

_ Want to be near - far away is bad - need him - want him - need to be close - want to be closer - protect him -  _ **_protect him_ ** _ \- need him - need to be close - want to kiss again - want to interface - want to know - want to know  _ **_him_ ** _ \- need to know - want him to know -  _ **_protect_ ** _ - _

His eyes flew open with a cry, and he realized he was laying flat on his back. There was so much emotion, so much feeling, it was terrifying and overwhelming and almost painful.

But . . . it also felt . . . good.

There were a few more to be processed, but they were minor footnotes. He’d gotten what he needed.

Now to analyze them.

 

One hour and sixteen minutes later, Markus sat up from laying in the snow. His vision was blurry and swayed alarmingly, his ears were ringing, and his thoughts were hazy and hard to focus on.

But, said thoughts  _ were _ organized.

He finally understood. The swirl of new feelings was finally satisfied. Exhausted as he was, and as slow as his scripts were, his mind was finally clear.

Or was it?

He could sense that he knew the deeper answer to his emotions deep in his coding. But . . . something kept him from diving there. He wasn’t quite sure why. Perhaps a greatly needed rest would help, as it often did.

Markus carefully made his way back to Jericho. His footsteps sounded odd, both too silent and with too much echo, at the same time. His motion felt weird as well, as if he was walking different from his normal gait.

He felt like he had just after become deviant - all over again.

He  _ really _ hoped feeling this strange and floaty wasn’t a regular occurrence in deviants. His database was quick to inform him that the first couple emotions he processed, analyzed, and understood, were probably going to make him feel odd, but as he got used to them, the symptoms would stop.

Finally, he was back inside Jericho, where he walked to the room he’d claimed for himself in a daze, seeing other androids without registering them and not quite noticing the world around him.

Markus slumped against the wall, his eyelids flickering. His vision darkened, his audio quieted, and he sank into rest mode easily.

 

He woke up slowly, a sure sign that he’d slept well. For a few blissful moments, he just relaxed, refusing to acknowledge the outside world and it’s problems he had to fix.

His systems kept reminding him however, until he finally stood up and closed his eyes, mentally preparing himself to face reality.

The second he fully entered consciousness, a new fact popped to the front of his mind. He observed it and stopped dead.

Apparently, going into rest mode had revealed the truth he was hiding from himself.

“Oh  _ shit _ .”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, fun story! I was looking for biblical names for Simon's past lover, because Simon is a biblical name and I kinda wanted to go for a theme, y'know? (I also thought Markus was a bible name, but apparently not). So I look up a list of names mentioned in the bible . . . and what name do I find?
> 
> J E S S E
> 
> So, naturally, I HAD to name him that. It was just too perfect an opportunity to miss, I mean, c'mon!
> 
> We had a lot going on this chapter, despite the smaller word count. Next chapter should be . . . a little less dense, but a little more intense. As always, thank you so much for reading! <3


	8. Freedom March

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The androids march for freedom.
> 
> To the surprise of utterly no one, it doesn't go well.

Their first freedom march had already ground to a halt, likely due to the troop of soldiers in full riot-gear, complete with full-body shields, formed a line across the street.

The dozens, maybe even hundreds, of androids at Markus’ back halted as he did.

“We came here to demonstrate peacefully,” he called to the soldiers. “And tell humans that we are living beings.” his voice echoed off the buildings, amplifying his words and making them both thrilling and terrifying. “All we want, is to live free.”

Through some sort of megaphone or loudspeaker, someone from within the enemy lines spoke. “This is an illegal gathering. Disperse immediately or we will open fire.”

“We’re not looking for confrontation,” Markus continued.  _ Why won’t they just listen? It’s like they don’t hear a word I say. _ “We’ve done no harm, we have no intention of doing any. But know that we are not going anywhere, until we have secured our freedom.”

“I repeat: this is an illegal gathering. If you do not disperse immediately, we will shoot.”

Markus bit his tongue.  _ They’re not even acknowledging what I just said. _

“They’re gonna kill us,” North whispered to him. “We  _ have _ to attack. There’s more of us, we can take them!”

“If we attack, we’ll start a  _ war _ . We have to show them we’re not violent. We have to stand our ground, even if it means dying here!” Josh protested in the same urgent whisper.

“This is your last chance,” the amplified voice repeated. “Disperse immediately, or you will all be killed!”

Markus quickly considered both options. 

They  _ could _ easily take them, they outnumbered the soldiers seven to one. And part of him desperately wanted to knock the humans down a few pegs.

But, standing their ground would send a better message, proving that they’re willing to stay for the cause, even die for their cause, while also proving that they wanted to stay peaceful, in one fell swoop.

“We have to show them that we won’t back down,” Markus murmured back. He raised his voice so the soldiers could hear him. “We stay right here.”

Several shields dropped, allowing soldiers to gun down the androids. A few bursts of gunfire, and his people were collapsing dead left and right.

Markus tensed, trying not to wince with every sickly thump. After only a few seconds, the shields were back up and the guns were quiet.

“DISPERSE! THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE!”

“We have to make a statement, we have to stay put, no matter what,” Josh rushed.

North shook her head. “Please, we can’t let them slaughter us without fighting back!”

Markus kept his gaze centered on the line of soldiers. “We’re not moving.”

More gunfire rang out, killing several more androids. One bullet nicked Markus’ shoulder, leaving a slash of blue that sparked from within.

“Markus, what are you doing? They’re going to kill us all!” North hissed.

Markus narrowed his eyes, thinking rapidly. There was really only one thing to do.

He took a few steps forward, hesitated, and with renewed resolve began walking toward the humans. Uneasy, the android ranks behind him did not follow. 

A few feet in front of the others, he closed his eyes, bracing himself for the bullet he knew was coming.

Right on time, it struck him in the chest, hitting one of his cooling components as well as a few wires connecting his left leg to his motion chip, and clouding his vision with warnings and error messages. He collapsed backwards, blinking blearily at the buildings and sky rippling overhead.

Dimly, he heard someone shout “No!”.  _ Simon? _

The soldiers were closing in. He could hear one of them cock their gun as they neared, heard over the shouts and screams of the androids fleeing, heard it over what sounded like an argument a few yards away.

He knew in that moment, with absolute certainty, that he was going to die. And all his coding rose up within him, fueling the desperate desire to live.

Markus had a plan. He  _ would _ survive.  _ Just a little closer . . . come on . . . _

But someone saved him before he could save himself.

“John?”

The android they’d brought with them from the warehouse flew into battle.

The soldiers turned on him viciously, throwing him to the ground and hitting him with their bats again and again, sickly crunches ringing out with each strike.

Someone hooked their arms under Markus’ and began dragging him backwards, away from the fight. He stared in horror as one of the soldiers hit John’s head again and again, until his bat was slick with blue. John crumpled, his glassy gaze staring into Markus’ eyes.

“Quick!” someone gasped. “They’re coming!” some quiet code in the back of his mind recognized the voice as North’s, but he barely registered the fact through the blinding white noise in his head.

Someone hoisted him to his feet and slung one of his arms over their shoulders. He leaned on them heavily as they hobbled forward, desperate to escape. He wouldn’t have even recognized the someone as Simon if not for the eyes. Scared but determined, and a comforting baby blue.

Markus let the blue depths swallow him, gladly losing himself in the process. It was a nice distraction from the choking numbness in his mind.

There was a gunshot behind them, and they all knew what it meant.

Markus’ coding wouldn’t let him ignore everything for long, and reality pulled him back all too soon. He ran a quick system check, which revealed that his left leg was malfunctioning and he could barely move it. Despite one leg being almost immobile, he still managed to drag himself along at a good speed.

Before long, they dodged into the nearest alley and slipped into the sewers. It was a far safer route to Jericho than the streets overhead.

None of them said a word to Markus all the way home.

 

They finally stumbled into Jericho, exhausted and grimy. North and Josh seemed to be pointedly ignoring Markus, and Simon seemed too timid to speak up.

The air around them was thick and buzzing with tension as they all sat down heavily along one wall.

North broke the taut silence and stood up.

“What the  _ fuck _ was that, Markus?”

“What was what?” he glanced up, eyes half-lidded from exhaustion.

“You walking  _ into _ a line of fire. You  _ idiot _ .” North retorted bitingly.

Markus winced. “I just thought-”

“No, you didn’t! You weren’t thinking! If you  _ had _ been, you wouldn’t have pulled that dumb shit!” North’s voice was rising. Simon shrunk down slightly, intimidated by her ranting.

“I - I didn’t mean-”

“You are the most idiotic, unthinking -” North cut herself off mid-yell, but her next words were quiet and raspy. “There is a fine line between stupidity and bravery, Markus. And you are walking that line.”

With a shake of her head, she stalked out of the room. 

Josh stood up and glanced at Markus. “She’s right, you know. There’s nothing  _ brave _ about scaring us like that.” he trotted after her.

Markus sighed and his shoulders slumped. Several moments passed, processors whirring, before he spoke in a broken whisper.

“I just thought maybe they were after the leader, me, and they’d let everyone else go if I . . .” he trailed off, defeated.

John’s death burned sharply in his mind, halting all other scripts. It hurt just to think about, and yet it was all he could think about.

Simon scooched closer, putting a hand on his shoulder reassuringly.

Markus ignored how his presence caused a flurry of thoughts to spring up and swirl about in his head. His current strategy was to ignore his feelings until they went away. He’d just started a revolution; he didn’t have time for this.

“Why didn’t you leave with the others?” he muttered, unable to meet Simon’s gaze.

“I . . . after you nearly died,” his voice shook on the last word, and dropped to a whisper. “I’m afraid that if I leave you’ll just . . . disappear.” 

“Simon . . .”

Simon dropped his hand and looked away. He twisted the fabric of his pants between his forefinger and thumb, a nervous tic that was oddly endearing.

Markus reached across before he quite knew what he was doing and wrapped his arms around Simon.

He froze. “What are you-”

“Shhhh,” soothed Markus, rubbing Simon’s back. “It’s okay. I’m not gonna leave you any time soon.”

Simon released a deep, shuddering sigh and leaned into him.

A small part of Markus was furious at himself, furious for giving in so easily, furious for wanting this when he should be focusing on the rebellion. 

But . . . most of him . . . liked it. He liked the feeling of someone pressed against him, cradled in his arms, soft and warm and  _ Simon _ .

After only a few minutes, Simon pulled away. “Thank you.” he offered a small, shaky smile, and Markus felt his scripts speed up.

“Glad I could help,” he replied. His cooling system had to work overdrive to make up for the component that had been shot, and interacting with Simon had only made it worse.

Simon frowned. “Where’d you get shot?”

“Biocomponent AC20L4, and a few wires connecting my leg to my mobility unit,” Markus explained. 

“That explains it. Your internal temperature was raising outside optimum parameters. You should go see Lucy. I think we still have some cooling parts left over, and she can fix your leg connections too,” nodded Simon.

Markus tilted his head. “You can read my temp?”

“It’s a caretaker thing,” he said, almost apologetically. “So I can tell if a stove is too hot, or if a broiler has been left on, or if the furnace is overheating.”

“That’s . . . surprisingly morally correct for CyberLife,” Markus contemplated.

“That’s probably why my model was superseded so quickly,” Simon shrugged. “Customers were getting too good a deal.”

They both chuckled for a bit, their laughter a welcome respite from the stress of earlier.

“Well,” Simon sighed. “You go and see Lucy, I’m gonna check up on North and Josh before they murder themselves or each other.”

“It’s not that big of a deal,” Markus protested. “There are plenty of androids that need Lucy’s help more than I do.”

Simon stopped halfway to the door. “Markus, you already tried to be a martyr once today. Please don’t do it again.”

Markus winced. “Well, when you phrase it like that . . .”

“You know, they weren’t . . . they weren’t really mad at you,” Simon paused in the doorway. “North and Josh, I mean. They were just . . . scared.”

“I know,” Markus murmured. “I won’t do it again, okay? . . . Probably.”

Simon glared at him, a smoldering gaze that would have made North proud. Markus backtracked hastily.

“I mean, I’ll  _ try _ not to be a martyr, alright? No promises. But I’ll do my best.”

Simon closed his eyes for a long moment. “That’ll have to be good enough.”

Markus stared after him for a long time before getting to his feet, no small feat with only one and a half working legs, and hobbled across Jericho to Lucy’s little corner.

“Hello, Markus,” Lucy greeted, hands clasped under her navel. “Come to repair your injuries?”

Markus didn’t respond. They both knew she knew the answer.

She beckoned him closer and gestured at the ground. “Lie down.”

He obliged, staring up at the strange android looming over him. Quite frankly, Lucy scared him a bit, but he trusted her. Sort of.

She rummaged through some boxes in the corner of the room, humming softly. It was a familiar tune, but Markus couldn’t quite recall the name without checking his databases.

Lucy pulled a component and a few wires out of a box and knelt next to him, pushing his shirt up without a care for personal space. He flinched as her cold fingers darted over his torso, analyzing his injuries.

Without warning, she spun a utility knife in one hand and cut an X over the entry hole of the bullet. Markus inhaled sharply as warnings and error messages clouded his vision and his mind.

Androids couldn’t feel pain, but they could experience what they called an “error overload”, in which error messages fill every space of their mind. It was  _ very _ uncomfortable, both overwhelming and terrifying, and could cause something akin to a painful migraine.

Lucy worked fast, ignoring his discomfort. She glanced up once to warn him: “This might reboot you by surprise.”

Then she disconnected his broken biocomponent from the rest of his body and ripped it from his chest.

A shaft of what humans might call pain stabbed through his head. His vision was entirely covered by error messages, layered multiple times in some areas, and black began to creep on the edges as his body tried to force a reboot. He blinked several times, trying to clear the blinding red from his eyes, and dimly realized there were tears trickling down the sides of his face.

His vision shrunk to a blurry oval as he came closer to blacking out. Suddenly, his every system froze as a new component was connected to his mainframe. The error messages vanished as his body performed several self-analyses and deemed him fully operational.

Markus sat up and massaged his temples with a groan.

“You likely couldn’t see or feel it, but I reconnected your leg with some spare wire before replacing that biocomponent. Your self-repair should take care of that slice on your arm,” she nodded at the wound, “And you’ll be good as new.”

“Thanks,” he said warily. “Any blue blood left?”

Self-repair took large amounts of thirium, and Markus was already running a little lower than he’d like. Run too low for too long, and he’d just shut down.

“Of course,” she handed him a waterbottle full of the stuff, which he downed quickly.

“Thanks for fixing me up,” he rose to leave.

She bowed her head in acknowledgement, her strange black eyes following him as he backed out of the room.

“Hey!”

Markus looked up to see Simon standing between North and Josh, a proud smile on his face.

“These two have something to say to you,” he shoved them both forward with a mischievous grin.

Markus knew what was happening instantly. “You guys don’t have to.”

Josh and North both relaxed instantly, despite Simon’s petulant expression. 

“It’s the thought that counts, Simon,” Markus consoled.

“So,” Josh piped up, all business. “What should we do?”

Markus sobered immediately. “Lie low for a while before we strike again. Let the media play it all out before we give them something new to report.”

North sighed. “We should strike when they least expect it, like right now.”

“No, we have to give them time to mull it over!” Josh protested.

Simon rolled his eyes at Markus, and they exchanged tired glances.

“Hey, easy, you two!” Simon interrupted them.

A new internal message appeared in Markus’ mind. His systems were warning him that the self-repair process would exhaust him, and his usual hour of rest mode might take longer.

“I need to rest, guys. Self-repair takes a lot out of me.” Markus backed away from them.

They waved as he went the little room he was starting to call his.

He leaned against the wall, closing his eyes.

John’s dull eyes, face covered in blue blood, appeared in his mind.

With a mental sigh, Markus entered rest mode, bracing himself for what was to come.

 

The nightmares didn’t hold back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am SO sorry for the wait guys! If you follow my Tumblr, I made a post a while ago about how this chapter was gonna be later than usual, but it wasn't supposed to take this long! Next updates should be closer together! Again, I am SO sorry!
> 
> As always, thank you so much for reading! <3
> 
> Also, I'm gonna start plugging my blog in here and you can't stop me XD check me out at: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/


	9. Simon's Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Markus needs to get John's death out of his head. Simon is a perfect distraction.

Markus was at the old abandoned building again.

He kicked aside an old magazine unhappily, frustrated and exhausted. His nightmares kept waking him up last night, so he only got about half the amount of time in rest mode his systems had recommended, and that was spread in ten-minute increments over a few hours.

He couldn’t even go for a walk to clear his head, because there were cops everywhere and apparently he was a “public menace”.

There was a piano in a corner of the room, which always amused him. Such an odd thing to find in a rundown building by a rundown ship infested with deviants. He sat at it, hoping some music would calm him down.

The piano reminded him of Carl, sweet memories that were painful to reminiscence on. His databases were quick to inform him that there was in fact a word for that,  _ bittersweet _ . 

He filed it away for later and stared at the keys before him. While he could play pre-existing songs flawlessly, he wanted to try to play something of his own, something spontaneous and truly his.

Markus gently placed his hands on the keys and played a few scales to get the feel of the piano before testing out a few of his own tunes.

The piano filled the empty space around him with music and colors. His databases related the somber notes to dark blue paint and leafless trees waving in the wind, an odd comparison, but an interesting one.

His song first started dark and gloomy, helpless. But he needed something just a little happier at the moment, and switched into a more upbeat tune. Pale creamy orange and crackling campfires spilled from the keys, relaxing and hopeful.

He sensed the tension draining away as he poured himself into the piano. He felt as if he was floating, the world around him dissolving until it was just him soaring through a blissfully peaceful, empty space, swirling with colors and images his databases had related to the music.

He was so captivated he didn’t hear the soft footsteps behind him. It wasn’t until he sensed someone on his peripheral vision that he even registered another person.

Markus paused his playing and glanced to his right.

Simon was seated cross-legged on the snowy floor next to his chair, a few stray snowflakes caught in his blonde hair. He peeked up at Markus when his fingers froze over the keys. 

“Why’d you stop playing? You’re really good,” his voice was soft, and hearing it so gentle caused a flurry of flustered thoughts.

“I wanted to see who was sitting next to me. I didn’t even notice you come up here,” Markus said.

Simon smiled. “You seemed pretty absorbed.”

Markus’ overeager databases were quick to compare that smile to rays of sunlight peeking through clouds and jars of honey. He mentally pushed the images away.

“Want me to keep playing?” he asked.

“Please do,” Simon gestured at the piano and planted his arms behind him to lean back.

Markus thought for a moment, pondering his next song. He’d just been playing something hopeful, and wanted to try something new.

_ Play a song for Simon, _ his traitorous circuitry offered.

_ No, you’re already in too deep, you need to get over him already, _ his rational side countered.

Before he quite knew what he was doing, he’d already decided, and began to play.

Simon’s song was full of light, hesitant notes like his soft smiles and sweeping crescendos like his endless hope and hard, low notes like his loyalty to his friends and his dedication to the cause. Cloud-scudded skies, pale roses, and cornflower blue poured from the keys.

Markus glanced over at Simon. His eyes were closed, a small smile twitching at his lips, rocking slowly in time to the music.

He felt his every program stutter and lag at the sight. He looked so peaceful and relaxed, his usual slightly-stressed expression gone, and the little smile was just too much.

And now he was looking at him, those beautiful blue eyes open and staring into his own and suddenly all those cheesy romance novels Carl had made sense now, he really  _ did _ feel like he was falling into them -

“You alright?”

Markus blinked several times and managed to look away. “Yeah, I’m . . . I’m fine.”

_ This is really getting out of hand. These feelings are just getting worse. _

“Why’d you come here?” Simon asked, standing up and brushing snow off his pants.

Markus leaned away from the piano. “I thought some music might calm me down. I wanted to go for a walk but . . .” he gestured helplessly at the city beyond.

“Something wrong?” Simon swung around to face him, standing on the edge of the building.

“I just . . .” Markus closed his eyes for a long moment. “John . . . left me shaken.”

Simon nodded gravely. “North and Josh barely kept me from doing the same.”

“You - wait, you tried to-to sacrifice yourself for me?” Markus stood up and took a few steps toward him, each footfall crunching in the snow.

“The second I saw you fall, I leapt forward. I had a whole plan, but North and Josh grabbed my arms and held me back,” Simon fiddled with his fingers, seemingly unable to meet Markus’ gaze.

“Why?” Markus asked simply.

“I . . .” Simon opened his mouth and closed it again a few times, selecting his words carefully. Then he shrugged. “For the same reason John did, I guess. You’re the face of our cause, Markus. We . . . we need you.” 

Markus nodded slowly, acknowledging his words but not agreeing with them. He’d need some time to think on that before he formed an opinion. He moved closer as Simon turned to face the city again. The rising sun was framing half of Simon’s body in gold and the other half in indigo shadow. Markus couldn’t help but file the image away under “beautiful”. Simon, the skyline backdrop, the contrast between light and dark, it was perfect.

“John’s sacrifice . . .” Simon mused, drawing Markus’ attention again. “If it wasn’t him, it would have been me, and for that I am grateful to him. But . . . next time it could be.” Simon spun to face him, eyes wide and panicked. “I’m  _ scared _ , Markus.”

The pure, honest fear on his face hurt to look at.

“Scared of dying? That’s -”

“No, not-not me,” Simon interrupted, shaking his head. “I’m scared of . . . of  _ you _ dying, before I can get to you,” he carefully lowered himself to sit on the edge, legs dangling, staring morosely into space.

Markus couldn’t do more than blink in surprise for a few seconds. His scripts were going a mile a minute, circuitry humming with a strange mix of delight and panic.

He managed to regain focus fairly quickly and strode over to sit next to Simon.

“I don’t think you guys need me as the ‘face of the cause’,” Markus noted. “I think you guys could manage just fine without me.”

“It’s more than that,” Simon sighed, but he didn’t elaborate. Markus had the feeling any attempts to pry further would only close him off more, and let the subject be for the moment.

They relaxed in companionable silence on the edge of the roof for a while. Markus’ storage drives noted that they’d spent a lot of time alone together lately, a fact that Markus was quick to tamp down, despite the tiny bit of him that was thrilled at the idea.

After only a little while, Markus’ eternal restlessness took over, and he hopped up and began pacing. Simon glanced over and gazed at him.

“What’s up?”

Markus shook his head. “I just wish we could get out of this place. I can only look at the same rusty walls for so long.”

Simon nodded empathetically. “I know. I wish we could leave too.”

Markus began pacing again, thinking and thinking to no avail.

“Hey, I have an idea!” Simon offered.

Markus glanced at him. “What is it?”

“Could you teach me how to play piano?” Simon asked, both shy and earnest at the same time.

Markus felt a smile creeping its way across his face. “Of course. Come here,” he beckoned.

Simon leapt up and dragged the big armchair over to the piano so he could sit as well.

“We’ll start with the basics,” began Markus, grabbing Simon’s hand. “I’m going to upload all the technical names and basic concepts into your mind, and we can go from there.”

“Is that how you learned?” Simon inquired, the skin around his hand deactivating to reveal the glossy white it disguised.

“The man I was a caretaker for had me download everything I’m about to give to you, and then taught me himself from there. So, yes,” Markus squeezed his hand and uploaded a copy of his knowledge into Simon. 

His LED flashed yellow before he nodded and pulled his hand away. “Got it.”

“Now, we’ll start with some short, easy pieces,” Markus continued. He played a little tune. “I want you to try and copy that.”

Simon nodded slowly and reached over. He closed his eyes for a moment, pondering, before replicating the tune almost perfectly.

“Good job! You got the notes down flawlessly, but your tempo was a little fast,” Markus observed. He played the tune again. “Try to keep the same speed.”

Simon bit his lip in concentration, a trait that was far too cute for Markus’ liking. He tried again, succeeding perfectly this time.

“Great! Now, try to improve upon it.”

Simon glanced up at him, expression anxious. “What do you mean?”

“Anything! Make it longer if you wish, move the whole thing up or down the scale, whatever. Make it your own. Make it better in your eyes,” explained Markus.

Simon stared at the piano for a few seconds before nodding and placing his hands on the keys. He extended the tune a bit, while keeping the same melody, and raised a few notes higher on the scale for emphasis, already showing signs of promise.

“Amazing!” Markus congratulated him warmly. Simon flashed a proud grin, a sight his databases compared to sparkling crystals and sunlight gleaming between the leaves of a tree. “Now, what you just did, keeping some of that pattern? That’s part of what’s called  _ melody _ . . .”

He taught him the basics and began to move to more complicated pieces. By the end of their quick training session, Simon could create some short, simple pieces on his own, and execute most complex pre-existing pieces flawlessly.

“Simon, do you ever . . . see colors or anything, when you hear music?” Markus asked as they relaxed after a particularly difficult piece. Simon’s  _ mind _ was capable, but he just wasn’t quite fast enough. Markus had assured him that it would get easier with time.

“Sometimes. My databases will occasionally pull up random imagery to describe the music I’m hearing,” Simon replied. “That song I just played, it was like thunderstorms and bright yellow.”

“I see it too. For me though, that song was dark blue and rolling oceans,” Markus related, trying to keep the excitement out of his voice.

Simon smiled, causing Markus to lag for a second as all his systems focused on that smile. 

He froze, LED cycling to yellow as he stared blankly into space with glassy eyes. Suddenly, he snapped out of it, the circle on his temple returning to blue.

“That was North,” he sighed. “Apparently Josh is convinced we were abducted and/or killed by the police. We should head back.”

Markus felt his shoulders slump. “Already?”

“It’s been two hours and four minutes since I got here,” Simon pointed out.

“I’m not ready to go back,” Markus murmured.

Simon patted his shoulder reassuringly. “Just don’t stay too long, okay? Or else Josh  _ and _ I will be worried.”

“I’ll be down in a few minutes,” Markus nodded. Simon waved and vanished down the stairs.

The second he had disappeared from view, Markus groaned and put his head in his hands.

His “ignore the feelings and they’ll go away” plan wasn’t exactly working. His feelings were only intensifying.

_ I’m sure this is only temporary. Give it a few days, and I’ll get over Simon and his soft smile and his gorgeous blue eyes and the way he’s always trying to make everyone feel better and the way he fiddles with hands when - no, dammit! This is the exact  _ **_opposite_ ** _ of ignoring feelings! _

Markus dug the heels of his hands up into his cheekbones, furious with himself.

_ It’s just temporary. It’s just temporary. I’ll get over it. It’s just temporary. _

But deep in the recesses of his artificial brain was a kernel of him that wanted it to last forever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am on FIRE! Look at how fast I'm writing these babies! I'm so proud! XD
> 
> This chapter was a TON of fun to write! We got a bunch of fluff, I got to write some characters with synesthesia which has been on my writing bucket list since forever, and things are only getting more gay! 
> 
> For some shitposting shenanigans and more DBH content, check out my blog: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/
> 
> As always, thank you so for much reading! <3


	10. No Building Left Untouched

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At last, we truly diverge from canon. The deviant androids of Jericho strike the whole city of Detroit under the cover of darkness.

After an entire long, boring day, an entire excruciatingly long, boring night, and an entire terribly, horribly long, painfully boring day, it was night once more, and the media had simmered down enough that Markus deemed it safe enough to strike yet again.

They’d spent the entire two days playing card and board games, or childhood games that Simon had taught them in the rusty halls of Jericho. Markus continued teaching Simon piano, and began to look forward to it as the highlight of each god-awful 24-hour cycle. They agreed on one session a day and one session at night if they were feeling it.

It was their own little tradition, even if they’d only had three total sessions so far. It was nice, just them and their music. Once, they’d gotten distracted talking about music and art and the way they perceived the world and their own experiences with becoming deviant, and their midnight ninety minutes became three and a half hours, with barely any piano being played.

That memory was burning brightly at the forefront of Markus’ storage drives, popping up unheeded when he least wanted it. Simon’s soft smiles and his earnest voice and all these opinions and ideas he’d never voiced before, never even hinted at having. It was a side of him he’d never seen before and it was _not_ helping all the emotions tangled around his presence.

Not to mention, there was a strange sort of atmosphere that came with the night. An odd feeling of freedom and confidence and invincibility. As if they could do anything and no one would see them, or be able to stop them. And talking with Simon for so long, under the cover of darkness with the stars smiling down on them, and occasionally seeing his face etched silver in the moonlight when he shifted his head, smiling with his eyes like it was a smile just for Markus, it flooded him with an inexplicable hopeful sort of feeling, mixed in with a desperate desire for that night to last forever.

It didn’t, of course. Simon had eventually winced and put his fingers to his temple, eyes scrunched shut with discomfort. Then he’d looked up at Markus glumly and explained that both North and Josh had overridden his mute and wanted them to come back _now_.

But even that searing memory dulled before the prospect of what he was about to do right now.

Markus and a small team of androids were standing in front of an average locally-run hardware store. A hardware store that happened to contain several holo-taggers within its stocks.

He motioned for the androids at his back to stay there as he stepped forward. A quick scan informed him of a few security cameras in the interior, and a few on the outer wall. He was currently standing in their blind spot, but he’d need to disable the security network before moving to the next step.

He mentally tagged everything with the security network’s ID red. It led out of the building into a telephone pole nearby before continuing down the street into the unknown.

Markus climbed the telephone pole easily, located the network line, and grasped it with a bare white hand. The security feed began to pour into his head, a very uncomfortable sensation, but he managed to fight through it and set up a quick interloop.

He slipped down the telephone pole, beckoned his small team of androids, and hacked the electronic lock on the door. He flung the door open and ushered everyone in.

They all went straight to the rack of holo-taggers and grabbed them, shoving them into backpacks. Within seconds, the rack was completely empty and the team simply left the store. Markus locked the door behind them.

There were several stores speckled across the city that sold holo-taggers. Right now, several small teams were raiding each of them in the exact same fashion he had.

Every single android of Jericho that could run and use at least one arm had been assigned a small part of the city.

Markus closed his eyes and mentally asked the other groups for status updates.

His eyes flew open as he smiled triumphantly.

Every android within their ranks had a holo-tagger.

 **Everyone, hit your designated areas. No building left untouched,** Markus sent to everyone who was out tonight.

The androids around him all split up and vanished in different directions.

Markus began running. His designated area was a half mile away.

All over the city, androids pulled out their holo-taggers and began painting slogans and the symbol of their cause across the buildings of Detroit.

Markus arrived at his area and clicked the switch on his holo-tagger. It hummed in his hand as he selected one of their slogans and scrawled it across the side of a building in glowing blue letters.

He’d chosen hologram-based graffiti specifically, as he wanted to send a message that could not be ignored, but could be removed easily. If they did any permanent damage, the humans would just have another reason to hate them.

 

A few miles away, North activated her holo-tagger and sketched the words, “WE CAN FIGHT” on the side of a house.

Across the city, Josh painted the slogan, “WE CAN LEARN” on the base of a skyscraper.

A few miles from that, Simon scrawled the words “WE CAN LOVE” on the side of a bridge.

 

In a shabby apartment, a young college student with shaggy, unkempt hair and stubble on his jaw couldn’t sleep. He peered out the window to see his building being covered with glowing blue letters and symbols.

He glanced up at his android, Alexa, and smiled. He pulled a holo-tagger from under his bed and pressed it into Alexa’s arms.

“Let’s go help them.”

 

In a little residential neighborhood, a rebellious teenage girl leaned out the window with a sigh. Her insomnia was acting up again and she was out of her prescribed sleeping pills.

Her eyes widened as she watched a lithe figure paint glowing holograms down her street, house by house. As it neared hers, she was struck by an idea and grabbed the holo-tagger her parents didn’t know about, tucked away under clothes in her dresser.

She snuck out the window and activated her holo-tagger. The family android, Pete, watched her dart about outside, helping the strange figure, but he did not stop her.

 

In the sleazy part of town, a biker gang was gathered in a moldy basement.

“The robot uprising is here at last,” one sighed contently, exhaling smoke from a cigarette glowing orange between their fingers.

Another grinned with yellowed teeth. “I’m ready to support any kind of revolution.”

They all nodded at that, and pulled out their own holo-taggers.

 

Markus froze as he heard police sirens near him. He finished the hologram he was working on and hit the deck, arms and legs tingling as his body primed his artificial muscles with thirium, ready to fight or flee if things went wrong.

A police cruiser pulled up on his street, only a few yards away.

“Fuckin’ androids - hey! I can see you! Stand up, hands in the air, now!”

Markus winced as the cop’s flashlight beam revealed him crouching next to the building. He stood up slowly, hands raised to show he was weaponless.

The officer inched closer before stifling a gasp. “You’re the leader one, aren’t you? Get in the car, now.”

Markus’ processors kicked into high gear as he quickly preconstructed a couple of his options. He quickly decided on one and took a step closer.

“Hurry up!” the cop spat, motioning at the car with his gun.

Markus nodded and began walking forward.

A counter in the corner of his vision carefully deduced the distance between him and the cop.

_Four meters . . . two meters . . . one meter . . . Now!_

Markus whirled to the left and grabbed the officer’s pistol, ripping it from his hands easily and tossing it over the cruiser, across the street. In the same motion, he bent his knees slightly and swung one leg out, sending the officer’s legs out from under him and knocking him to the ground.

Then he began to run as the cop began to shout indignantly.

He ducked behind a building, sprinted across the street and slipped into an alleyway. Hearing the sirens start up again filled him with panic. Hurriedly, he pulled some cardboard boxes from a dumpster and flung them down before hurling himself to the ground and crawling underneath the dumpster. The boxes covered him from the front so someone could only see him if they went around to the side.

He could barely fit in the narrow space between the metal and the pavement, but that was part of what made it such a good hiding place.

The sirens grew closer, and he could see flashes of red and blue reflecting off the opposite wall of the alley. His cooling fans sped up to quench the panic overheating his components. Their rising whine could give him away if the cop got too close.

What he was about to attempt was risky, but it was the only choice. He closed his eyes, dove into his coding, and manually turned off his fans. He could only hope the officer would leave before he had to turn them back on to avoid overheating.

Markus placed his forehead against the cold pavement, relishing the small reprieve it gave. Warnings with a few error messages sprinkled in began to pile up in his eyes.

He gritted his teeth and waited.

After what felt like an eternity but was in fact only two minutes and thirty-six seconds, he heard a door slam and the cruiser pulled away.

He switched his cooling fans back on and scrambled to get out from under the dumpster. He sucked in huge gulps of the cold night air, using it to help cool down his internal systems.

He only got a few minutes respite before forcing himself to return to the task at hand.

Markus sighed deeply, watching his hot breath condensate into miniature clouds in the cold air. He still had a few buildings to tag before his area was completed.

 _No building left untouched,_ he reminded himself, and trotted back to the building where the cop had found him to grab his holo-tagger.

 

As androids finished their designated areas of the city, they returned to whichever store they’d borrowed their holo-taggers from and carefully returned their tools to the shelves.

Sirens began whining all over the city as more and more police realized what was going on. The station called in more and more officers to hunt for deviants. Almost all their police cars were in use.

 **Fall back to Jericho once your areas are done and your holo-taggers are returned. If you have to, lose the police on the way. Do not lead them to Jericho,** Markus sent out. Several androids sent a feeling of acknowledgement in return.

Markus placed his borrowed holo-tagger on the rack and quickly calculated a zig-zag route back to Jericho. Taking a straightforward way there was a little too risky.

He stared in wonder at the buildings around him as he wandered through the city. The entire Detroit area was glowing blue with hologram graffiti. Symbols that represented their cause, simple art of hands clasping each other, slogans scrawled over walls. It suffused him with a strange, electric mix of hope and power and pride, all at the same time.

Of course, as it did without any tasks at hand, his mind turned to Simon. He wondered idly how he was doing, followed immediately by a stab of fear as he considered the possibility of him being hurt or abandoned or killed.

Markus forced the negativity from his mind with a hiss of annoyance.

Each android had painted slightly different messages, and he was fascinated to see what Simon had done. He quickly edited his roundabout route to take him through Simon’s section and began to run.

“DEACTIVATION = DEATH”

“WE ARE ALIVE”

“WE CAN LOVE”

“LIFE WITHOUT FREEDOM IS HARDLY LIFE AT ALL”

“WE CAN BE KILLED”

Markus brushed one of the holo-letters in wonder, watching the pixels glitch around his hand. He hadn’t expected Simon’s ideals to be so thought-provoking.

 _Life and death are two sides of the same coin, Markus. You cannot have one without the other. Life without the risk of death is not life,_ Carl had once told him. Simon’s messages reminded him of the old man’s wise words.

He smiled and realized he couldn’t wait to see Simon again at home.

Some dim background code pointed out the fact that he was starting to see Jericho as a home, and his smile widened.

 

Finally, he arrived at Jericho.

However, he didn’t go inside yet. Out of nowhere, a sudden fear had appeared, a deep and horrifying fear.

The idea of going in and _him_ missing _terrified_ Markus.

So he waited outside. He’d told all the androids who were participating in tonight’s event to check their name off a digital list once they got inside Jericho. Once the slow trickle of deviants reaching the old freighter appeared to have stopped, he’d check the list for any missing names.

Around three-thirty in the morning, it seemed everyone who could get there, was there. Markus steeled himself and checked the list in his head.

He stopped dead. _There’s no way._ He double-checked, then triple-checked.

No missing names.

Everyone had lived.

Markus realized he was grinning uncontrollably and stood up shakily. He knew a hidden entrance into Jericho from the far side, which could be easier than climbing into it, and began to sprint.

The deviants of Jericho looked up nervously as loud footsteps rang in the corridors, getting louder as someone grew closer. Their uneasiness vanished however as a familiar shape skidded to a stop just inside the large central chamber.

“No fatalities!” Markus yelled triumphantly. “Everyone lives!”

There were a few seconds of stunned silence before the androids began cheering. Markus was dimly aware that he couldn’t seem to stop smiling, but it felt good. He hadn’t been this happy in a while. It felt good to _really_ smile, not just the little smiles Simon could draw out of him, but a full-on, giddy grin.

He scanned the room quickly, revealing that his three closest friends were not there. He deduced that they were probably in the little room with the dirty plexiglass windows, the one looking over the largest chamber, and sprinted up the stairs to get to them.

He flung open the door to find three anxious faces. Upon seeing him, their expressions shifted from worried to relieved, and they all hopped up.

“Why are you so late? We were so worried!” Simon approached him with arms spread wide for a hug.

“No fatalities!” Markus explained excitedly. “Everyone’s alive! It all went off without a hitch! Everyone’s alive!”

For a decisecond, the idea of kissing Simon right here and now crossed his mind, but instead he pulled him into a tight embrace, ignoring his squeak of surprise. After a few seconds, he realized he’d probably held on a little too long and hastily pulled back, still grinning.

Simon smiled, a sight that filled Markus’ mind with images of golden sunlight and caused him to lag for a full second.

North and Josh were smiling as well.

“It all went perfectly? Everyone returned the holo-taggers and everything?” Josh asked, ever worried.

“Yes! And everyone got home safely! No fatalities!” Markus sang. He was positively giddy. The satisfaction of a plan going perfectly right, the glee of seeing Simon okay, the delight of success, the joy of knowing everyone was safe, the elation of knowing no one had gotten killed or captured because of him.

“I don’t think we’ve ever seen you this happy,” North remarked. Josh nodded from beside her.

“It’s good to see you really smile,” Simon agreed softly.

Markus’ systems stuttered but he managed to keep them in line. “Hey, want to go have a session right now? I create best when I’m happier.”

Simon’s face lit up. “Right now? Of course!”

Markus grabbed Simon’s hand, ignoring his scripts speeding up at the physical contact, and pulled him out of the room.

North and Josh glanced at each other.

“They’re absolutely hopeless,” North shook her head.

“Completely,” Josh agreed.

 

In the old building just outside of Jericho, Markus sat down at the piano and glanced at Simon eagerly.

Simon settled in his seat. “So, what are we playing tonight?”

“I was thinking we would just create tonight,” Markus explained. “You first.” he gestured at the piano and leaned back so Simon could play.

Simon closed his eyes and put his fingers to the keys.

They played a few original pieces before Simon mentioned the events of that night and suddenly they were lost in conversation.

It wasn’t until the sun was rising that they realized how long they’d been there, just talking with each other with some songs being played here and there.

“North and Josh are going to be _furious_ ,” Simon moaned.

“I’m honestly surprised they haven’t even tried to contact us yet. I half expected them to come up and drag us down there,” Markus observed.

“It’s really strange,” Simon agreed, leaning back in his chair.

Markus felt a wave of exhaustion crash over him. He hadn’t slept in over forty-eight hours and the night had been quite eventful, resulting in him using a sizable amount of RAM.

“You alright?” Simon’s voice brought him back.

“I need a few hours of rest mode,” Markus groaned, rubbing his forehead.

“C’mon, let’s get you back to your room,” Simon offered, standing up.

Markus got to his feet slowly. His vision was decreasing in quality as his body tried to conserve memory. “Can you . . . help me? I’m in 240p right now and I can barely see.”

Simon laughed quietly, a beautiful sound, and put his hands on his shoulders from behind. “I’m going to guide you, okay?”

They managed to get to Markus room without incidence, where he collapsed in the corner weakly.

Simon patted his shoulder reassuringly. “Sleep well, Markus.”

The inexplicable urge to kiss him rose up again in Markus’ coding, but he tamped it down successfully.

Simon smiled and quietly left the room and then the darkness closed around Markus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote almost all of this in one day! Inspiration just came out of nowhere and this happened! This chapter was really fun to write, but I'm not super satisfied with the ending . . . hmmm . . . oh well! I'm thinking next chapter will be from Simon's PoV . . .
> 
> Markus is only falling deeper still into feelings >:) good good
> 
> For some shitposting shenanigans and more DBH content, check out my blog: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/
> 
> As always, thank you so for much reading! <3


	11. Duet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Simon plays some piano while waiting for his friends and crush to wake from their rest mode. After a bit, Markus joins him at the instrument.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S FINALLY HERE

Simon closed the door of Markus’ room and leaned against it for his support, his knees weak. His mind was focusing on replaying and analyzing the events of the last few hours over and over again, and it was using up all his processing power, leaving little strength to control his body.

His thoughts were a mess, a blinding whirl of emotions and images and mental phrases being repeated like a mantra in his head.

He would have been content to stay there, drooling over Markus, for quite a while, but his caretaker programming reminded him to check on Josh and North. He heaved himself off the door, stumbling a bit as he stepped forward.

He’d mostly composed himself by the time he got to the room where the others were situated. He could sense that he still had a wide-eyed stare, but it was barely noticeable.

However, when Simon opened the door, he found both of them curled in opposite corners of the room, deep in rest mode. He smiled and closed the door, leaving them in peace.

He remembered the time they’d cornered him, just a few hours before they marched the streets of Detroit. The three of them had been playing cards when North suddenly leapt up, closed the door, and whirled to face him with fiery eyes.

“What’s the deal, Simon?” she’d demanded. “You’ve been acting . . . _weird_ since the CyberLife store raid. You’re quieter, almost _shyer_ , and you’ve been with Markus a lot more these past few days.”

“We’re worried about you,” Josh had elaborated. “Did something happen at Capitol Park? We just want to make sure you’re okay.”

Simon had blinked several times, a whole flurry of emotions crashing into him at the same time. “I . . . er - I . . . I, uh . . .” he’d trailed off.

North and Josh had glanced at each other. Josh nodded once at North, and she turned back to face Simon.

“You’re in love, aren’t you?”

At which point Simon had covered his face with his hands and they had _known_.

 

He smiled fondly at his friends. They looked so peaceful when they were sleeping, all the tension and stress drained from their faces. He worried about them sometimes, with their tight voices and furrowed brows and sad head shakes. Someday, he hoped, they’d smile and laugh every day.

He closed the door quietly and left them to rest.

Now, he was at a bit of an impasse. His friends were all in rest mode, and would be for an hour at least. He’d already gotten his hour of rest mode just before they’d all set out, so he couldn’t join them in sleep.

Lonely nights were the worst part of Jericho. They reminded him too much of crouching in alleyways, wishing for the warmth of a house filled with kids’ laughter and the smell of cookies baking in the oven. Of walking the streets with his head down, desperate to get to that place a broken android had seared in his memory.

He cleared the memories from his mind with an impatient shake of his head. He could dwell on them later, when just thinking about them wouldn’t tear him apart.

For now, he’d go to the piano.

Simon hurried to the old building, striding past a few androids who looked at him blearily as he passed. The supplies from their raid were running thin, as more and more androids in need of biocomponents and thirium trickled in. He couldn’t believe the raid was only a few days ago. So much had happened since then it felt like a lifetime ago.

He rushed up the steps and settled before the piano. The sun was rising into the sky, burning away the few wispy clouds and turning the sky from a dusky cobalt to the color of one of _his_ mismatched eyes.

Simon mentally slapped himself. _You’ve been out here for 17.2 seconds and you’re already thinking about him. Get a grip, Simon._

He shifted in his seat, turning to the keys to distract him from his traitorous hard drives, which kept trying to bring up memories from past sessions before the instrument. His hands froze over the pale surface of the piano as he considered what to play, chewing on his bottom lip in concentration.

_What would Markus play - no, no, no, we’re not going down that road._

Eventually he picked a pre-existing song with a sigh. He wasn’t very good at creating his own music yet. He wondered idly if he was too distracted staring at Markus to learn much, but after checking his memories, he deduced that while he _did_ do a lot of staring, he’d also been listening to the lesson. He supposed creativity was simply something that would take him a while to learn.

He played for a while. It took longer than originally planned to get through each song, as whenever he messed up a note, he’d restart.

It both annoyed and pleased him that he kept botching up notes.

It annoyed him, because as an android, he was accustomed to doing everything correctly on the first try. However, his programming was not built for playing piano, and while his mind _knew_ what notes were supposed to go where and when, his fingers kept hitting the wrong things by accident.

Yet, it pleased him as well. It was nice to have the ability to make mistakes, to mess something up and just start over again, no consequences, no pressure. Not to mention, the ability to fail reminded him that he was alive. _Computers_ did not make mistakes. _People_ did that.

It felt good to be a person sometimes.

He played some classical piano pieces, Bach, Mozart, Dvořák, Brahms, before quickly getting bored of it. He dove into the online library of sheet music for androids to download, scanning for any piano covers.

His old owner had liked old songs from the earlier 2000s. Simon searched for some of his favorites now, downloaded the sheet music, and began to play. He knew the lyrics like he knew his own programming.

He could _hear_ them in his mind, timed perfectly to the piano. Just hearing the tunes brought the words to the forefront of his storage drives.

Colors and images poured into his head in sync with the notes. He wondered idly if humans experienced music the same way. His databases immediately educated him with several articles on synesthesia, specifically chromesthesia.

He played for two hours and eleven minutes, utterly lost in his music, in the heavenly sounds around him, in the colors and images and comparisons his databases showed him, in the words singing in his head.

Simon blinked. He could _hear_ the lyrics, sung soft and beautiful. Was he still just hearing the words that leapt unbidden to the tune of the song, or was someone really singing them?

He continued playing, listening carefully. It didn’t really sound like his mental voice, but it was too soft to tell. His databases helpfully informed him on several mental illnesses involving hearing voices in one’s head.

He paused abruptly, his curiosity too strong to bear.

“Oh, why’d you stop?”

_Oh._

That liquid-gold voice rolled over Simon, bringing several programs stuttering to halt, and leaving him lagging for a full three seconds. He blinked as he caught up to reality, his scripts speeding up, as they generally did when he was within ten feet of Markus.

 _Of course it’s_ **_him_ ** _._

“I didn’t even know you were there,” Simon replied, turning to face him.

He felt all his love for him crash down upon him once again.

Markus looked . . . _happy_. His eyes were twinkling, his stance relaxed, a faint smile twitching at his lips. The sun was gaining strength in the sky, lending a rosy light to everything it touched.

Simon blinked slowly, filing away the sight before him as “beautiful”.

“Didn’t you hear me singing?” his voice was light and almost lilting, devoid of all the stress of the past few days.

“Well yes, but I thought maybe I was just hearing the lyrics playing in my head,” Simon smiled, ignoring how his thirium pump sped up just by talking with him, leaving a tingle in his chest.

Markus ambled over to him, and sat down in the little seat next to Simon’s armchair. “We need a piano bench.”

Simon looked up quizzically.

“It’s easier to teach and easier to learn if we’re closer together,” he explained smoothly. “That way neither of us have to lean across a chair to reach any keys.”

Simon nodded slowly, not trusting himself to say anything. _Closer together would be . . . nice._

Markus’ face sobered. “Suppose we’d have to wait for the press for to cool down before we show our faces out in the open again, though.”

 _I don’t mind being stuck here if it’s with you,_ Simon thought, but he didn’t say that. “Ah yes, how’s the media reacting?” he asked.

Markus grinned, and Simon nearly crashed on the spot.

“Exactly as planned. Around eight am, they started broadcasting about it. I’m guessing the news wanted to wait until people were up for maximum views. We set the media on _fire_ , Simon.” there was a dangerous glint in his eyes that made Simon weak at the knees. “The best part is, they’re reporting humans that were working alongside us, helping us. There are even some humans coming right out and saying they helped us, they’re proud of it! News outlets are scrambling to get interviews with these guys before the other outlets can get to them.”

Simon narrowed his eyes, processing this new information. “That . . . explains a lot actually. I heard some humans cheering when I painted their apartment building, but I thought it was a coincidence. And I saw more than one person working on one area on the way back to Jericho, too.”

Markus leaned back with a content smile, eyes closed. “They have people working on taking down the graffiti downtown, but there’s at least one hologram on each building, so it’ll take them a while to work all the way to the outer edges. So far, they can’t find a single building untouched. We just made history.”

Simon found himself smiling as well. “Wait until we earn our freedom. _That_ will be something for the history books.”

Markus opened one eye, blue as the sky overhead but much deeper, to look over at him. “Yeah. Yeah it will.”

He seemed like he was going to say something more, but decided against it.

They relaxed in companionable silence for a bit.

Simon spent the time wisely, looking at Markus. He was in the shirt he’d worn during the march, a gray and blue hoodie that clung to his body and offered Simon a _very_ nice view. His expression was relaxed, content even, eyebrows no longer furrowed with stress, eyes closed peacefully, a strange, almost-smile curving the corners of his mouth.

He glanced up and realized Markus was watching him through half-lidded eyes.

“Oh!” he yelped. “Sorry, I was - erm, I was just spacing out.”

“You know, we could just make our own piano bench,” Markus suggested, seemingly not hearing him. “I’m sure there’s enough debris lying around to just build our own.”

Simon thought quickly, scanning several previous memories. “Actually, there’s - here, just follow me.”

He stood up and strode briskly down the stairs of the old building, hearing Markus’ footsteps thumping behind him on the rickety wood.

There was a room in the building just filled with scraps of wood. In it, he knew, there were two crates of the same height, and a wide wooden plank that could fit them both. _Barely,_ he noted with some satisfaction.

“Aha! These’ll work!” Markus stepped forward and grabbed the crates Simon was eyeing, smiling at him on the way by. “Good find, Simon.”

Simon smiled shakily back, ignoring how his systems lagged for a moment at the compliment.

Within minutes, they had a little bench set up. Markus sat down and patted the spot beside him, looking up at Simon with hopeful eyes.

Simon sat down hesitantly, one leg dangling off the edge. Markus glanced over suspiciously and shot him a playful glare.

“C’mon, scooch in. You’re half off the bench,” Markus offered.

Simon slid over as his scripts began to speed up with a strange blend of nerves and excitement. His leg was pressed against Markus’, and he could feel the heat of the other against his artificial skin. He barely smothered a shiver as a few background programs crashed. His mind was entirely focused on just _how close_ they were, how warm he was against him, the way every miniscule movement Markus made sent a thrill over his entire body.

 _I’m not going to be able to learn anything like this,_ he realized.

“Do you want to work on that song from last time?” Markus asked, bringing Simon out of his thoughts.

“The one I’m making?”

“Yeah, that one,” he clarified.

Simon shrugged. “Sure.”

He lifted his hands and paused, hovering his fingers over the keys as he considered of how to continue his song. It was difficult to focus with Markus so damn close to him. When he’d raised his arms to play, it had brought his shoulder against Markus’, and now the whole right side of his body was buzzing with a maelstrom of warmth and pleasure and anticipation, though, he didn’t know what exactly he was anticipating.

He managed to concentrate on the music long enough that he began to play, and then it came easily. Light yellow and lime green began to tinge his thoughts, his databases displaying images of soft mist and long prairie grasses waving in the wind.

Simon didn’t even realize his eyes were closed until he heard Markus say his name, low and quiet, and they flew open.

“Here, I’m going to pause you for a bit,” he murmured. Simon dropped his hands into his lap, allowing Markus room on the piano to play.

“Did I mess something up?” Simon asked anxiously. Markus glanced at him and smiled, gaze soft.

“No, it was fine,” Markus reassured him. “I just want to show you how _I_ would improve on it. Obviously, it’s your song, so no need to take my opinion to heart.”

He played the same tune, but raised the latter end on the scale, giving it a more hopeful feel, and raised some high notes higher to give them emphasis.

Simon nodded. “I think it sounds better that way.”

They played for a while, Markus stopping Simon and editing his song a bit every few minutes. As he continued, Markus’ interventions grew few and far between. Eventually Simon deemed it acceptable and played the whole thing, which he named “Perhaps”, from start to finish.

He let the last note linger until it finally fell quiet and looked up at Markus for approval.

His face was an odd combination of pride, awe, and some sort of far-away expression, as if he were reminiscing on fond memories.

“I’m . . . I’m glad I met you, Simon,” he said abruptly, meeting Simon’s gaze. “Being stuck in this rusty ship and rotting building, it’s . . . it’s okay because of you. I don’t mind being trapped here if I’m trapped with you.”

Simon’s entire OS stuttered and he nearly blue-screened. He blinked several times and met that mismatched gaze, admiring the warm green and brilliant blue for a moment before remembering that he should _probably_ respond.

“Thank you. I . . . that-that means a lot to me,” Simon replied. Part of him wanted to look away from those piercing eyes, but he couldn’t bring himself to. He was lost in their depths and he loved every second of it. “I’m glad I met you too. I was wasting away in Jericho until you came along. You didn’t just ease the suffering, you . . . you removed it entirely.”

Markus stared at Simon until Simon drew back slightly, unsure if he’d gone too far.

“I don’t know how to respond to that,” he said with a little laugh. “Thank you doesn’t really cut it.”

Simon smiled. “You don’t have to respond. I just wanted you to know.”

Markus tilted his head slightly, eyes narrowing just a hair, as if he was pondering something. Simon was reminded of just how close they were, legs touching, faces less than half a meter apart, shoulders brushing.

“I . . .” Markus looked away, his expression almost . . . bashful? “I really like these sessions at the piano. Just you and I, alone with our music. It’s . . . it’s the best part of being cooped up here.”

Simon could see a small smile spread across his face, and from the way it slowly appeared, he knew it was involuntary. For a moment, the idea of kissing him, right here and now, sprang to his mind, but he quickly tucked it away.

“I like them too,” Simon murmured. “It’s my favorite part of the day.”

Markus gaze fell to the piano, seemingly avoiding Simon’s eyes. “Sometimes, I just want to stay here with you forever.”

Almost of all Simon’s programs crashed, leaving him with a steady stream of _holy shit,_ and, _don’t pass out_ , repeated again and again in his head. _He wants to - I might overheat - he_ **_wants_ ** _to - wants to stay with_ **_me_ ** _\- don’t crash, Simon -_ **_forever_ ** _, he said_ **_forever_ ** _._

“I thought it was just me . . .” he mumbled, barely conscious of the fact he was speaking.

Markus had turned to face him again, and his face lit up when he heard Simon, a sight his databases compared to glowing dawns and shafts of sunlight peeking between clouds.

Simon was torn.

Half of him desperately wanted to flee before he embarrassed himself. His thirium pump was racing, his limbs thrumming as his body prepared him for _something_ , the few scripts still running were racing a mile a minute, fans whirring as they tried to cool him down. He knew it was only a matter of time before he slipped and revealed too much.

But half of him wanted to stay here as long as possible. He wanted to sustain the warm tingle in his chest, the buzzing in his arms and legs, the delightful whirl of adoring thoughts. Most of all, he just wanted to stay near Markus as long as possible. Just being around him made him so damn _happy_. Talking to him, sitting this close, hearing such sweet words from such a sweet mouth; it was heaven on earth.

Before Simon could even comprehend it, the stay-here half had won him over.

“D’you wanna play some pre-existing pieces now?” Markus asked.

“Sure!” Simon let his fingers rest on the keys, searching the online library for a song he was really feeling.

Beside him, he felt Markus settle into his seat, leaning forward and resting his forearms on his thighs. He felt . . . closer. His leg was pressed up against Simon’s, his elbow resting on Simon’s thigh, their shoulders bumping.

Simon wondered if Markus truly didn’t notice, or if he just didn’t care. _He_ certainly noticed, and he most certainly cared. It made it very difficult to focus.

He decided on one from his old owner’s playlists, one that reminded him of Markus. Admittedly, most things reminded him of Markus, but this song especially.

He focused on the music and began to play.

Beside him, Markus made a faint noise of recognition and began to _sing_.

Simon nearly lost his rhythm. He glanced over at him, eyes wide. Markus smiled at him between words and tilted his head back to sing to the heavens.

For two minutes and fifty-one seconds, they were just outside of reality, lost in their music.

All too soon, the song ended and he leaned away from the piano in disappointment.

Markus clasped Simon’s wrists in his hands, his palms warm and slightly rough, and gently placed his hands back on the keys.

Simon stared him wide-eyed, lagging for several seconds.

Markus smiled. “Keep playing.”

Simon looked back to the piano, blinking a few times and not really seeing what was before him. Unable to formulate speech, let alone a response, he just nodded dumbly and moved to the next song in the playlist.

He turned his head to watch Markus sing as he played, appreciating every lyric as it fell from his lips, admiring how his whole body moved ever-so-slightly with each word, as if his entire being was trying to sing, not just his mouth.

Halfway through the song, he glanced over and grinned at Simon. He motioned to Simon and then put his fingers to his lips and mimed something springing forth.

He knew immediately what he meant. “Oh, I . . .” he trailed off before he could come up with an excuse. _What do I have to lose?_ he thought, and opened his mouth to sing.

Markus’ smooth, pure tenor, and Simon’s soft, hesitant, voice mixed with the divine piano notes and swirled around them. Simon’s head was filled with colors and images and a steady flow of disbelieving joy running beneath everything.

After a few songs, he was so dazed he kept fumbling notes and needed a break. He leaned back in his seat, hiding how hard he was breathing.

“Sorry, I need a break,” he explained apologetically before Markus could say anything.

“That was amazing!” Markus gushed. “I’ve never sung with anyone before and that - it was incredible! You sounded so good, and us - together, with the piano - we were stunning!”

Simon laughed happily. “It _was_ amazing. _We_ were amazing.”

Markus’ pleased grin melted into a tender smile. When he spoke, his voice was low and soft. “Thank you, Simon.”

“An-anytime, Markus,” Simon glanced away, feeling his cheeks burning. “You’re a really good singer by the way.”

“You’re a great piano player,” Markus countered. “And thank you.”

Simon gazed intently at the piano, feeling himself blushing. “Thanks.”

He could sense Markus staring at him, but he didn’t trust himself to look away from the piano. After a few minutes, he heard Markus chuckle lightly.

Before he could say anything however, North’s voice cut into Simon’s mind.

“ **Josh wants to play Clue and you guys have already been up there for hours. Are you capable of tearing yourself away from your little date for a bit?** ”

Simon groaned at her teasing words. “ **It’s not - oh, nevermind. We’ll be there in a moment.** ” After a moment, he added, “ **If you say anything weird when we get there I will never forgive you.** ”

He could just _hear_ North’s disappointed sigh.

“ **You’re no fun,** ” she replied, and severed the connection.

Simon looked up at Markus. “That was North. You up for some Clue with Josh?”

Markus sighed. “He _always_ wins.”

“I know,” Simon agreed. “I’ll see if we can play some Uno after a couple games of Josh destroying us.”

Markus considered a moment before nodding. “I’m down.”

Simon stood up shakily, wobbling on his feet. He took a step forward and nearly fell, but suddenly Markus was there, clutching his arms and keeping him upright.

“Th-thanks,” he panted, ignoring how his thirium pump was racing in his chest, his scripts speeding up.

They made it down into Jericho safely, with Markus keeping a watchful eye on Simon for anymore slip-ups. Before long, they reached the room where Josh had Clue all set up and was eagerly awaiting their arrival.

Simon collapsed into a chair and couldn’t keep a dumb smile off his face for the entire game.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am SO sorry for the wait guys! A TON of real-life issues came up (including but not limited to: my room flooding, being manipulated into going to a family gathering, and learning my best friend is moving away :'D), and I just never had the time to work on it. 
> 
> Updates might be slower starting on the 23rd, as I have to go back to school. But they shouldn't ever take this long again, and if they do, I'll give you guys a warning next time. I apologize again for the wait!
> 
> So, how did you guys enjoy Simon's point of view? It was a lot of fun to write a character who's just so SO in love. And it was pretty easy to write as well; I just channel all my thirsting over Markus into writing. Despite the wait, I'm pretty happy with this chapter!
> 
> For some shitposting shenanigans and more DBH content, check out my blog: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/
> 
> As always, thank you so for much reading! <3


	12. Brief Respite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Markus manages to convince the others to head outside for a bit. On the streets, he makes several important realizations.

Jericho was quiet. The only noise was a light wind in the rusty halls and the low murmur of hushed conversations.

All was quiet and peaceful in the freighter, except for the little control room on deck. It was quite loud, and certainly not peaceful.

 

“This is a absolutely terrible idea. Simon, back me up here,” Josh protested.

“Sorry, Josh. I’m with Markus on this one,” Simon replied.

“It’s cold out, we can cover our faces and no one will care!” Markus countered. “We don’t even have to do anything. I’d be content if we just walked around the city and talked.”

Josh rolled his eyes. “You’re all insane. Actually insane.”

“C’mon, Josh, don’t you want to get out of here for a bit? It would be perfectly safe!” Markus tried.

“There are cops _everywhere_! That’s not perfectly safe!”

“We’d cover our faces with scarves and wear thick coats to hide our body shapes,” Simon offered. “No one would suspect us.”

“Oh yeah, cause nothing’s less suspicious than people running around with their faces covered,” retorted Josh.

North gestured wildly at the window. “It’s fucking _winter_! Everyone’s gonna be covered!”

Markus decided desperate times call for desperate measures.

He sighed deeply. “Alright, Josh, you can stay here if you want. But _we are_ going outside, whether you like it or not.” he beckoned the others and turned to leave.

“Just the three of you? Alone?” Josh squeaked.

Markus didn’t answer or turn around, already out the door.

“Okay, okay! Fine! I’m coming!” Josh hurried after them.

Markus barely held back a smug grin and began to run.

 

There was a _lot_ of residual holo-graffiti. While city employees had been taking down some the messages in the downtown section, they hadn’t worked their way to the suburban areas or outskirts of the city yet. The media was still in uproar, as people came up with their own ideas and theories and submitted them to news outlets. In some areas, the holograms were celebrated, supported, agreed with, and in others they were defiled, defaced and talked down.

Markus dragged his hand through the blue pixels, watching them distort around his fingers and feeling the rough bricks of the building underneath.

“You’d think that if we could get every building in Detroit branded in a night, they’d be able to get every building _unbranded_ in a night,” North remarked.

“Humans aren’t as efficient as us,” Josh shrugged. He seemed very nervous, his shoulders raised and his stance tense, as if he were expecting an attack at any moment and wanted to be ready to run.

Markus pulled his hand from the holographic graffiti, brows furrowed. Seeing their work in the daylight was . . . odd. It made it seem more real, under the harsh light of day, but more detached at the same time, as if the androids hadn’t done it. As if it had been here all along, just a part of the city.

Markus shook his head to clear the weird, surreal thoughts from his mind. “So, any place in particular we wanna head? Or are we just gonna wander?”

Josh heaved a theatrical sigh. “If we’re stuck out here either way, I’d like to visit the library.”

“I wouldn’t mind seeing that park we were at a few days ago,” Simon offered timidly.

Markus nodded, filing away their suggestions for later use, and glanced at the only member of their group to have not spoken. “North?”

She shrugged. “I’m fine wandering.”

He nodded slowly and accessed a digital map of Detroit. “So, we’ll meander over to the park, then meander over to the library. Plenty of room for exploring all the way. Sound good?”

They all bobbed their heads in agreement.

None of them had been outside during the day for so long, the entire city seemed unfamiliar, almost dream-like. There were a few inches of snow on the ground, blanketing the yards in thick white. Some sidewalks had been completely shoveled clean, some had narrow, winding pathways through the snow, some had trails of footprints packing the snow down until it was like solid rock, and some were completely unbroken expanses of frost.

The city was oddly quiet in the winter, due to the sound-dampening snow. Car tires whirring on the slushy asphalt seemed overly loud and out of place. There was a strange whisper in the air at all times, like the snow itself was murmuring to itself, but it was just strange wind acoustics.

It was refreshing with its chilly temperature, fascinating in its novelty, but unsettling in its strangeness.

While the four of them walked in companionable silence for a while, eventually the quiet of the city became oppressing. North finally broke the silence, and the other three gratefully dove into conversation.

They talked with each other comfortably until they at least reached the playground. It too seemed strange and new, the metal support poles frosted and the woodchips hidden under white snow.

“It seems so weird like this,” Simon said, voicing Markus’ thoughts.

North and Josh both nodded in agreement.

Markus stepped forward and ran his hand along one of the railings on the merry-go-round, smiling as he recalled their last meeting with this playground. “Remember that time we tried to launch this thing into orbit?”

“Unfortunately,” Josh grumbled. “I nearly died flying off that thing.”

North grinned. “Good times.”

Josh shot her a glare and she clapped him on the back to take the sting from her words.

Simon sat down on the side of the merry-go-round, his weight causing it to creak loudly in the white silence. “It’s . . . odd without any children around.”

His words held a strange, subtle conviction. Markus pondered on it for a moment before deciding to consider it in detail later.

“It feels like we’re alone with the world,” North murmured. “An empty playground with almost-as-empty roads.”

Markus shivered, and it wasn’t from the cold.

They walked around the playground for a bit, but it seemed so unnatural when it was covered in snow and completely silent, that it unnerved them all. Simon seemed particularly affected, oddly quiet with a drawn expression.

When Markus suggested forging on to the library, they all agreed quickly, relieved to be leaving the rather creepy park behind.

They were halfway to the library when Markus spotted a purple glow a few blocks away.

“What . . . what am I seeing?” he asked, squinting at it. “What kind of an office building would have 80s-style purple neon?”

He looked over at the others, hoping for clarification, but the expression on North’s face distracted him. She looked . . . scared, with some sadness and anger mixed in, but mostly _scared_.

 _What in the known universe could ever scare_ **_North_ ** _?_ He didn’t think she could be frightened by anything, and he had the feeling that whatever that building was, it wasn’t something he wanted to see.

“From the location and what I can see from here,” Simon piped up, “It’s the . . . the . . . oh no.”

“What? What is it?” Markus asked, dread building.

Simon grimaced. “The Eden Club.”

Markus looked it up quickly and nearly recoiled in horror. “I didn’t . . . I didn’t know humans could ever be so . . . how could they . . . that’s so . . .” he was rendered speechless.

“That’s so messed up,” Josh shook his head. “That is _so_ messed up.”

Markus glanced at North. She was being uncharacteristically quiet.

And suddenly, he understood everything.

“Tomorrow night,” he found himself saying.

“Tomorrow - what?” Josh asked, puzzled.

Markus glared at the purple glow peeking from the buildings around it with new resolve. “Tomorrow night we’re raiding that . . . that _place_.”

He braced himself for the objections, formulating arguments to shoot them down, but none came. In fact, his three friends were all nodding in agreement.

He felt a glow of pride for his companions and quickly made a detour in his route to go around the Eden Club rather than past it.

They arrived at the library with no further incidents. Josh let out a content hum the moment they entered the doors. It was warm and cozy in the library, with yellowish lights that added a candlelit atmosphere to the building, and tall walnut shelves stacked with book after book after book.

“This is the only library in Detroit that keeps exclusively paper books,” Josh explained happily. “With electronic ones, I can just analyze the entire contents in a few seconds. But with paper books, it forces me to _read_ it, and then it has a much greater effect on me.”

The bookshelves, with the weathered spines of books proudly announcing their titles, filled Markus with a sense of something his databases classified as nostalgia.

They reminded him of Carl.

North tapped Josh’s shoulder. “Hey, don’t you have a book you wanted to show me? At the other side of the library?”

“I di-” Josh started, then recognition bloomed on his face. “Oh, right! C’mon!”

The two of them speed-walked away, leaving Markus and Simon alone near the front doors.

“That was . . . odd,” Markus understated.

Simon nodded thoughtfully.

Markus felt his scripts begin to speed up. They’d never exactly slowed down from yesterday, when he and Simon had been singing together, but now they only accelerated further.

 _Yesterday . . . when I said I sometimes wanted to stay up there with him forever, and he_ **_agreed_ ** _. Yesterday, when I said I loved our sessions and he_ **_agreed_ ** _. Yesterday, when I said he made the dullness of each day bearable, and he said I was like that for_ **_him_ ** _._

 _Yesterday . . . when he said he_ **_liked spending time with me_ ** _._

Just thinking about it made Markus smile dreamily, a fact he rather resented. He disliked that Simon could make him feel things completely out of his control.

But at the same time, he rather liked the feelings themselves, so he supposed he could put up with it.

“Oh, I meant to ask you,” Markus addressed Simon. “Are you alright? You seemed kinda . . . sad almost, when we were by that park.”

“Oh, I . . .” Simon looked away, smiling sadly. “It’s stupid.”

“C’mon, what is it?” Markus pressed.

Simon sighed and met his eyes. “I used to take the kids there a lot. One winter, they begged me to go to the park after a snow. It was just us. We had the whole playground to ourselves.” his gaze dropped to the carpet. “Going there just reminded me of them is all.”

“Your old owner’s kids?”

He nodded slowly and blinked several times in rapid succession.

“Do you miss them?”

Simon closed his eyes. He didn’t reply for a few moments, and when he did speak, his voice was quiet and bruised, heavy with memories and emotion. “Yes.”

Not really aware of what he was doing, he reached over and grabbed Simon’s hand, squeezing it once reassuringly.

“It’s okay,” he murmured softly. “I miss the old man I cared for, too.”

Simon took a deep, shaky breath. His hand was warm in Markus’ grasp.

“Thank you,” his voice was so quiet Markus barely heard it.

Markus felt the sudden urge to pull him closer and kiss all his problems away, but he resisted it.

He suddenly realized he was still holding Simon’s hand and released it with a mutterd apology.

Simon opened his mouth to say something and closed it again. “I . . . I . . . Markus, I . . .”

Markus tilted his head curiously.

Simon chewed his bottom lip, a nervous tic that was both adorable and oddly enticing at the same time. Markus let himself admire him for a moment before ripping his gaze from Simon’s lips with an incredible force of will.

“I need . . . you need to . . .” Simon shook his head. “I’ll, um . . . I’ll tell you later. Maybe.”

Markus narrowed his eyes at him, but didn’t pursue the subject. “Alright. No pressure, okay?” he smiled warmly at Simon and was rewarded with a bright smile in return.

“I wonder where North and Josh went?” Simon wondered aloud.

Markus shrugged. He rather liked being alone with Simon, as terrifying as it was. “No idea.”

“Hmmm . . . so, what kind of books do you like?” he asked abruptly.

“Uh, I haven’t really read very many,” Markus confessed.

Simon gasped. “Really? That’s - that’s - we have to fix that!”

“It’s not that big of a-” Markus protested. But Simon grabbed his arm and began to tug him along.

“First, nonfiction or fiction?”

“Um, fiction?”

Simon wove effortlessly between the bookshelves, dragging Markus behind him. “Here! _The Mysterious Benedict Society_ trilogy. You’ll love it.” he pulled three books off the shelf and shoved them into Markus’ arms.

Then he whirled and strode off in the direction they had just came.

“Simon! Wait up!” Markus whisper-shouted, hurrying after him.

“Now, I know you said fiction, but you seem like the type who’d like a book that’s based off nonfiction,” he looked at Markus for clarification, but continued on without waiting for a response. “Perfect! _The Millennial Project_ , enjoy.”

Arms laden with four books, Markus nodded dumbly.

Simon flashed him a grin and it made it all worth it.

“So, what do you want me to do with these?” Markus asked. “We don’t have enough time to read them here, and I don’t want to . . . steal them.”

Simon looked _offended_ . “Of _course_ you’re not stealing them! We can just make you a library account. Here, you can do it digitally in a few seconds.”

Markus accessed the library website quickly and made himself an account in just under a minute. “Okay, now what?”

Simon cocked his head. “Have you never been in a library before?”

“ . . . no . . .”

“It’s okay,” Simon smiled. “I’d be glad to teach you.”

Markus lagged for a good half-second at his words. “O-okay.”

Simon led to him to the front desk, which was fully autonomous. “Here, put your books here and type in the number they gave you here.”

Markus placed the books on the counter. A grid of red lasers scanned them quickly, and with a friendly beep, a keypad popped out of the counter. He tapped in the long number the library had given him, his account number, and then the books were his.

“We must be some of the last people to use paper books in Detroit,” he remarked dryly.

Simon shrugged. “You’d be surprised. Most people above twenty were born before electronic books got popular, and a lot of them prefer paper ones.”

Markus hmm-ed noncommittally and tucked his books into a paper sack hanging from a peg on the counter.

“Oh, there was something else I wanted to ask,” he remembered. “Do you guys know where North came from?”

Simon’s expression darkened. “We’ve never asked her, but we have a general idea. Just a couple months ago, she arrived at Jericho, eyes wide and scared . . . she was wearing nothing but underwear under a big blanket. She flinched away from anyone who got too close. We had some old clothes in a trunk that we gave to her, and then she started getting better as the days went on.”

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Markus asked. “Because today, when we passed that . . . you know . . . wasn’t she acting a little weird?”

Simon nodded. “That’s what I was thinking too.”

Markus sighed. “That’s so messed up.”

“I know,” Simon agreed sadly. “I know. Thank you for coming up with raiding that place, by the way. She’ll never admit it, but that made her happy.”

Markus nodded, but didn’t respond. They sat in silence for a moment, both lost in their own thoughts.

Markus glanced over at him and was suddenly struck by how damn _pretty_ he was. His head was tilted up towards the ceiling slightly, lips slightly parted and eyes narrow with thought. The warm-hued lights of the library made his hair glint pale gold, filling Markus with the strange longing to run his fingers through it. His eyes glittered sky-blue between long, light lashes.

He turned to face him, meeting his gaze, and Markus felt several systems crash. He could get lost in them, those twin cornflower-blue oceans. They accented the yellow of his hair so nicely, being complementary colors and all.

 _I really am in too deep, aren’t I?_ Markus thought, but he realized he didn’t care anymore. The part of him that had argued against his feelings for Simon for so long, reminding him that he couldn’t get distracted from the cause, telling him that surely it was temporary, was silent. He just . . . he just wanted to love Simon and he wanted Simon to love him back.

The realization slammed into him like a wall, causing several programs to grind to a halt. It felt like he was standing on the edge of a very deep ravine, wind whipping around him. It felt as if the ravine had been covered until now, and only just now had the cover been ripped away, only just now had he realized what he was standing on the edge of. Only just now did he realize just how deep the ravine was.

And yet, Markus couldn’t bring himself to try and change that. He _liked_ being in love with Simon.

Carl had told him about romantic love numerous times, but he hadn’t mentioned how just looking at someone he loved so much could stop all his programs in their tracks, he hadn’t mentioned how that someone would be on his mind all the time, or how . . . _good_ it felt.

All of this, Markus realized in a few seconds. He blinked stupidly, amazed by his new discoveries.

Abruptly, he realized Simon was talking to him.

“Markus? You okay?” he asked, his face concerned.

“What - of course - oh, sorry, I just, um, I spaced out for a bit there,” Markus replied, still somewhat dazed.

“You sure?” Simon tilted his head.

“Yeah, I’m - I’m more than okay,” Markus said, a smile growing on his face. “I just figured out something out.”

Simon peered at him quizzically, but dropped it with a shrug.

Markus felt better than he had in days. He was well-rested and unconflicted for the first time in far too long. He could tell he was still smiling and did nothing to restrain it.

Simon grinned at him unexpectedly. “You look happy.”

“I am. That thing I figured out had been bothering me for a while,” Markus stood up and extended a hand to help Simon up.

Simon’s smile widened as he took his hand. “It’s good to see you in good spirits.”

Markus’ systems stuttered, but now he welcomed the sensation rather than resenting it.

“Hey!” North’s head poked around one end of the bookshelf. “We’re ready to go.”

“How many books is Josh checking out?” Markus asked.

North rolled her eyes. “The whole damn library, it looks like.”

The three of them snickered and walked to the front desk, where Josh was eagerly cramming books into three separate bags.

“Josh, how are you going to carry all that home?” inquired Markus.

Josh glared at him. “I _got it_.”

Before long, they were all outside once again. Markus was carrying both his and Simon’s bags, North had her backpack set comfortable on her back, and Josh was nearly crippled by the weight of his bags.

They set off for Jericho in high spirits, laughing and chatting easily.

The trip back didn’t seem to take nearly as long, and before they knew it, they were slipping into the old freighter and carefully stacking their books in one of the few completely dry rooms of the ship.

Markus relaxed in his little room, content. Despite how much he’d been looking forward to their little outing, coming back to the familiarity of the rusty walls and metallic floors and echoey rooms and the way you could hear something dripping constantly during brief periods of silence, it was nice too. It was just nice to finally be seeing Jericho as his home.

He stood up with a stretch and leisurely strolled to the book room. It felt good to have the pressure lifted for a bit. The part of him arguing with his feelings toward Simon was gone, there were no people depending on him at the moment, no humans trying to kill him.

He sat down and opened _The Mysterious Benedict Society_. He couldn’t wait to tell Simon what he thought of it.

But he had only read a couple chapters when he had to pause. There was something gnawing on his mind . . .

The Eden Club raid!

And now there, that was something he was both good at, and liked doing.

Coming up with plans.

He sat cross-legged in one corner of the room, the paperback book laying in his lap. He began to think.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BACK IN BUSINESS BABY LOOK HOW FAST I'M WRITING
> 
> I doubt I can keep this speed up, but I can try! I'm aiming for one chapter every few days, so expect that instead of this crazy high update speed.
> 
> I liked this chapter a lot! I got to plug some of my favorite books, Markus has some Character Development, and we got to learn a little bit about the other members of the Jericrew! 
> 
> Are you guys excited for the Eden Club raid? Cause I am! I feel like we should have gotten to take that place down in canon, but alas, cage failed us again. But, hey! That's what fic is for!
> 
> For some shitposting shenanigans and more DBH content, check out my blog: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/
> 
> As always, thank you so for much reading! <3


	13. The Raid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Jericrew manages to infiltrate the Eden Club without problem. It's when the cops find them halfway to Jericho that they have a problem.

Markus was approximately ten seconds into the main part of the plan, and already regretting it.

All four of them were needed for the operation. North knew the layout of the building and gave them the blueprints, and she was currently off hotwiring a very large car. Josh was on perimeter, watching for any police that could obstruct their plan.

Markus and Simon would be the ones infiltrating the club itself.

Earlier that day, Markus had explained that they would need to pretend to be clients in order to get in, but he didn’t have much more than that.

North was the one who explained that customers could rent the androids for a day or two, and return them at the back door that faced the alley. Running with that idea, Markus had suggested a  _ pair _ of infiltrators, one who was pretending to be human, and one who was pretending to be a rented android. Once inside, the one pretending to be human would continue on and pull the fire alarm.

The four of them had agreed that this was the best approach, but they didn’t know who would play what role.

Markus had quickly volunteered himself as the one pretending to be a docile android. He didn’t want anyone else to have to degrade themselves. But who would be the human?

At this point, things had gotten strange. North and Josh had agreed for once, as they both suggested Simon to play the human without hesitation. Markus was suspicious, but their explanations and reasoning seemed sound. Still somewhat uneasy, he decided to trust them.

And now, behind a dumpster in the alleyway near the back entrance to the Eden Club, he was stripping down.

“This seems really weird,” Markus hissed.

Simon’s back was to him, granting him a very small modicum of privacy. “North said the returns usually come back with nothing more than a coat that the owner takes back upon delivering,” he choked out. He seemed to share Markus’ dislike of the situation.

It was quite dark in the alley, but both androids were equipped with crude night vision. This fact only intensified Markus’ discomfort. Even in the shadows, Simon would be able to see him. And, even worse, Markus himself could see the scars and blemishes and dents from the junkyard, and seeing the evidence of that  _ place _ on his very body was a horrifying thought that spawned memories and sensations that he tried again and again to delete from his hard drives.

Markus snatched his long coat from the floor and gratefully pulled it on, relief washing over him as he was (sort of) clothed once more. Being in nothing but boxers and a long coat still felt quite strange. His bare skin was picking up more than a dozen unfamiliar sensations, his processors whirring as they analyzed each one.

“You - erm, decent?” Simon said in a strangled voice.

“Something like that,” Markus muttered. He disliked the wear and tear on his body on a good day; in front of  _ Simon _ , it was even worse.

Simon turned to face him, cheeks flushed. “This - um, th-this really weird, Markus.”

“Agreed,” he grimaced. “Let’s get this over with.”

“H-how do I . . . um, ‘act like a customer’, exactly?” Simon mumbled, gazing intently at the pavement.

Markus shrugged, marveling at the way his jacket swished against his bare shoulders. “Just act like the creepy fuck who’d rent an android.”

Simon didn’t seem satisfied with this answer, but it didn’t matter. There was no time to debate specifics. They had a very small window to get everything done that needed doing.

The duo approached the violet glow of the Eden Club slowly, dread building with every step. When the peered in the back door however, they discovered that the little workshop area was completely devoid of any humans. In fact, other than a fan running in one corner of the room, it was dead silent.

Markus sighed and slipped out of his coat once more. “Alright, you know what to do.”

Simon looked away from him quickly, an odd, choked sort of sound escaping him. He scampered hurriedly toward the door, glanced once at Markus, and disappeared into the Eden Club.

Markus quickly freed the Tracis in storage in the corner, and told them to act natural and pretend he was one of them. He weaved between androids until he was in the very corner, where he was least conspicuous.

He closed his eyes, unable to look at his own limbs or chest. His right eye felt like it was buzzing slightly, as if perhaps his optical unit was malfunctioning or missing entirely. 

_ It’s all in my head. I’m not there. I’m fine. I’m fine. _

The sensation didn’t lessen. His stress levels slowly rose as the time passed. Where  _ was _ Simon? Surely he should be pulling the fire alarm by now.

_ What if something happened to him? What if someone recognized his model and called him out? What if he’s scared or hurt or dead? What if they’re throwing him away right now and he’s  _ **_there_ ** _? What if they suspect he has accomplices? What if they find me and they bring me back there I can’t go back there I can’t go back there I can’t go back there - _

The piercing sound of the fire alarm shattered his spiral into a panic attack and set all his processors whirring at high speed, heightening his every sense. Blessedly cold water shot from the sprinkler in the ceiling, dappling his face with icy droplets and refreshing his focus. He had a mission.

He slipped out from the cluster of Tracis, pulled on his coat - the buzzing in his eye halted almost immediately - and forged into the depths of the Eden Club, brows furrowed, face stony.

The Eden Club was about as twisted and perverted as he had expected. A slow, futuristic beat throbbed below the blaring fire alarm. The room was lit in a warm, purplish glow, and there were strip poles set in the center, glowing bubbles passing through their shiny, translucent lengths.

But the thing that caught his eye were the the things along the walls. Clear, cylindrical containers, set against the wall. In almost every one, an android swayed sensually behind the glass. A keypad next to each container could release the android for use - for a fee of course.

If Markus had human anatomy, there would be bile rising in his throat.

_ Like animals, _ he thought numbly.  _ They’re keeping us in cages, selling us, making us pretty for the customers. Like animals. _

There were quite a few new emotions surfacing, but he didn’t have time to process them. He buried the disbelief and sorrow and fury, and channeled the emotional energy into righteous indignation and passion. 

These androids would suffer no longer.

Markus quickly scanned the area with his largest scanning radius.  Already, the building was empty. A few humans were rushing towards the door, body heat heightened from whatever activity they’d been engaged in. He suppressed a shudder of revulsion and deactivated the skin around his hand. It seemed violet rather than white in the unnatural lighting.

He stepped forward, coding surging up in his head, but before he could hack one of the containers, all of them abruptly slid open in unison with a dozen pneumatic hisses. Simon must have hacked them through the fire alarm.

The androids walked forward slowly, uneasily, staring around in wonder. Markus strode up to one of them and placed his hand on their shoulder, interfacing with the oddly sparkly Traci.

She pulled back slowly, LED rapidly blinking yellow. Her hair was slicked to her head, laden with water, so she seemed thin and frail, pathetic even. Markus felt a pang of pity in his programming.

Simon came running, shoes slipping on the wet floor. “Hurry!” he called. “The alarms called the fire department automatically, I - I couldn’t stop it!”

He ran his hand through his hair, sending droplets of water flying and spiking his hair in dark flaxen points. Markus nearly crashed on the spot. He was in the midst of an android sex club, on a mission to free his people, alarms blaring and flashing around him, water everywhere, and the police were on their way. And he  _ still _ couldn’t stop thinking about Simon.

He was glad he no longer berated himself for that though. Instead he could revel quietly in his love for him.

But there was no time for that.

Markus raced through the Eden Club, freeing androids left and right. Simon followed him nervously, fiddling with the hem of his shirt.

He was almost finished when the alarms shut off and the sprinklers fizzled to a halt. In the sudden silence, they could hear a loud siren, just outside from the sound of it.

“Th-they’re, um, they’re here,” Simon whispered.

Markus thought quickly. “Simon, get to the back door with the others. North should be here by now.”

“What a-about you?” he protested.

“I’ll be fine!” he waved it off. “There are still androids who need to be freed. Go!”

Simon hesitated. “I can’t leave you!”

Markus whirled and grabbed his arm, pulling Simon closer to look him in the eyes. “It’s too dangerous. I can’t lose you, Simon.” there was far too much emotion in his voice and they both knew it. Markus would have to explain himself sooner or later.

Simon hesitated still. Was it the gaudy lighting or was he blushing once more? But then, suddenly, he could  _ see _ the fire rekindling itself in his eyes. His face was like steel, his mouth a grim line. “Together.”

Markus sighed. He knew there was no convincing him otherwise. “Stay close and don’t die.”

He began to run once more. There was only one more room he had to get to, and they could escape. His sopping coat flung drops of water everywhere as he raced in and began interfacing with androids, releasing them from their bonds of programming. Simon was right on his tail the whole way, following him carefully.

**Hurry up!** North’s voice rang in his mind. He ignored it and continued. Just a few more androids needed to be freed.

“Hey! Anyone in there?”

Markus and Simon both froze.

**They must have noticed the lack of fire,** Simon entered his mind with a panicked voice.  **They think someone must have set off the alarms deliberately, and they think that person might still be in here! They’re going to find us!**

Markus gripped the arm of the last android and sent a bundle of emotions through the connection.

**That’s the last one! Let’s go!** He grabbed Simon’s arm and pulled him along, sprinting through the dripping and oddly silent Eden Club, leaping over large puddles.

He tumbled out into the little workshop area. Through the open door, he could see a large, unmarked red semi waiting in the alley outside. The androids he had just freed were already huddled inside.

One last scan confirmed his fears. The firemen were inside, they were nearing the back door, they were too close -

He shot out the back door and ripped the passenger-side door of the semi open, flinging himself in.

Simon hopped in after him, and North had the gas pedal to the floor before he even closed the door. The tires screeched as the truck pulled away sharply.

For a moment, the cab was eerily quiet aside from the faint whine of cooling fans.

“Where’s Josh?” Markus panted.

“In the back,” North grunted. “There are only three seats up here and he didn’t want to delay anything by having to move.” she glanced at Markus and looked away just as fast. “Could you put on some more clothes, maybe?”

“Or don’t,” Simon mumbled. Markus looked at him curiously for a moment before deciding he must have misheard.

And then North checked the rearview mirror and shrieked.

Simon twisted around in his seat to see what she was screaming at, but the sharp and unmistakable rapport of gunfire answered his unspoken question. A police officer was leaning out the window of his car, shooting at them wildly.

“They found us,” Markus breathed.

“What do we do?” North shouted, zig-zagging over the road in evasive maneuvers. Her passengers and precious cargo were shoved back and forth and against each other.

Markus ignored the sensation of Simon against his bare arm and forced himself to focus at the task at hand. Pushing his processors to their limit, he formulated a route and quickly sent it to North. “Download this and follow it!”

She nodded once, and turned sharply to the right, throwing Markus into Simon. Simon squeaked in surprise, an adorable sound, and just for a second Markus let himself enjoy being pressed up against him, the feel of his dripping clothes on his bare skin, the body heat below his clothes that he could just barely feel on his external sensors.

Then he pulled away with an apologetic look at Simon, and strapped them both in with seatbelts. The truck shuddered under them as North gunned it.

More gunfire exploded, and the passengers up front all heard a few bullets tear through the back of the semi. 

**North, we’re taking casualties!** Josh yowled. 

She gritted her teeth and made another sharp turn followed by another in the opposite direction and sped down a few blocks before turning sharply once again. Simon grabbed Markus’ arm to help stabilize himself, unknowingly crashing a few of his backburner programs in the process.

Another sharp rapport of bullets. The thin metal of the container shrieked as it was ripped by hot lead.

“Josh!” Simon gasped.

**We need to lose them!** Josh cried in their minds, and the three up front all released a sigh of relief in unison.

Abruptly, North screamed and slammed the brakes, nearly throwing her two passengers through the windshield. Markus mentally thanked seatbelts for existing.

A large police cruiser had pulled in front of them, lights flashing but sirens silent.

“We have to get through,” North panted with panic, fans whining audibly.

**Why are we stopped?** Josh’s voice was laced with fear.

“There’s no time to go around!” she cried. “What do -” She broke off suddenly, interrupted by the slam of the car door.

Markus strode toward the police cruiser, his resolve making his steps confident. He paused beside it and waited for the cop to come around the side, unsuspecting.

The completely and utterly  _ floored _ look on his face would be something Markus treasured for a very long time. Carl’s mischievous nature had rubbed off on him over the years.

The officer went for his gun, and Markus took one step forward and disarmed him easily. He ripped the magazine from the handgun and hurled them both in opposite directions.

“I don’t want to fight,” he whispered, letting some of his desperation seep into his voice.

The cop didn’t reply, staring at him with scared eyes and an ashen face.

“Please,” Markus murmured. “There are innocent androids on board. We just want to get them to safety.”

“None of you are  _ innocent _ ,” he stammered back. “You’re just a machine! You can’t be  _ innocent _ , because you can’t be-”

Markus grabbed the cop’s shoulders and met his gaze. “Look at me,” he pleaded. “Do you really think ‘just a machine’ could fake emotion like this? There are androids aboard who haven’t experienced happiness yet. The only emotions they’ve known are helplessness, loneliness, sorrow, fear, panic, and anger. We want to give them that. We want to give them happiness. Love. Friendship. Freedom. We just want to be free.”

The officer stared into his eyes and then his gaze flickered around Markus’ face and finally he stepped back without speaking.

Markus closed his eyes, wondering why North hadn’t escaped while she could.  _ Because they won’t leave you, _ his mind whispered.  _ But if they die, it’s your fault. _

“Go.”

His eyes flew open. The cop was turned away from him.

“I’ll tell them you went somewhere else. This didn’t happen, okay?”

“You’re letting us -” Markus checked himself and paused. “Thank you.”

“Go!” the officer shouted.

Markus raced back to the semi and leapt in, ignoring the speechless stares of the others. “Gun it.”

North was all too happy to oblige.

 

The ride home was silent and tense. Dread was building in all of them as they grew closer and closer.  For at Jericho, they would have to count the bodies.

Markus subtly stared at Simon the whole trip. It was much easier to distract himself getting lost in those cornflower-blue eyes and pale skin and dripping blonde hair than it was to even think about how many androids had died in the raid, how many androids were bleeding out and shutting down just a few feet behind them.

He felt a stab of sympathy for Josh. The poor android had seen so many - too many - die before him.

All too soon and all too late, they arrived at Jericho.

Slowly, North reached to open her door. The click of the latch seemed unnaturally loud, or perhaps the world was unnaturally silent. Simon and Markus followed her lead mutely.

She unlocked the back of the semi, flung the double doors open, and took a half-step back with a pained gasp.

Markus had never understood the phrase “they felt hollow inside” until now. It truly did feel like there was a gaping hole, a gargantuan cavern, an endless void, inside him. 

The inside of the container was  _ painted _ with blue blood. Too many mostly-naked androids were sprawled on the floor, their wounds staining their artificial skin cobalt. Josh and the survivors were clustered in the middle of the container, eyes wide and haunted.

Silently, they began helping androids out of the back of the truck. Those with injuries were told to go to Lucy. None of them could muster a “welcome to Jericho” or any proper greeting at all, really.

“Josh. Are you okay?” Simon asked, breaking the uncomfortable quiet.

Josh blinked a few times and shook his head slowly. Markus scanned him and winced. His right leg was completely disabled by a bullet in the thigh, severing all connection to his motion modules. The metal strut in his forearm, the android equivalent of a human  _ radius _ and  _ ulna _ ,  was completely broken, snapped cleanly in half. A couple of his processors were jacked up as well, causing his entire system to run much slower than it should.

“Go to Lucy,” Markus said. “I think she has enough parts to help you.”

Josh nodded hesitantly and began to walk unsteadily towards the healer’s corner, stumbling and limping due to his faulty leg and lagging system.

_ They never got to feel experience happiness, _ Markus thought. _ Their only moments were of terror and pain. _

_ That was because of me. _

_ They’re dead because of me. _

North’s shriek pulled him sharply back into reality. She was kneeling beside a Traci’s corpse, one hand on its cheek. Markus and Simon glanced at each other and leapt into the semi to see what was going on.

“Amelia . . .” she murmured, tears sliding down her cheeks. “She was deviant before I was and - and after I went deviant I realized what she was and - and - and I always wanted to - I never got to -”

Her voice was swallowed by static as emotion overwhelmed her voice box and she collapsed onto the Traci’s chest, body shaking with sobs.

Markus felt something within him break.

Simon knelt beside her, touching her shoulder lightly. She jerked away from him and swatted at him blindly.

“Get away!” she snarled and he backed away hastily.

“I don’t want to leave you to-”

“GO!” she roared, and then, quieter, “Please . . .”

Simon looked at Markus helplessly and hopped out of the semi. Markus followed him, numb.

_ This was a mistake. This was a mistake. This was a mistake. _ The words circled in his head again and again, a mantra of regret and sorrow and hatred.

“I’ve . . . I can’t . . . I’ll, um, be back,” he muttered, turning his back on Simon and walking away swiftly. The second he was out of eyesight, he began to run.

He didn’t know where he was going until he got there.

The abandoned building, of course.

He curled up in the corner farthest from the piano, drawing his knees up to his chest.

He didn’t even want to be leader. The speech after the CyberLife raid had been a snap decision, an impulse. Yes, he believed they deserved freedom and rights. Yes, he believed they should fight for them.

No, he didn’t think he should be the one leading them.

At the end of the day, he just wanted to be back with Carl. He wanted to live that peaceful, warm, amber-hued life once more. He just wanted to play chess and go for walks in the park and make breakfast.

Instantly, his own thoughts attacked him.

_ How can you even think of betraying your people like that? You’d rather live with a  _ **_human_ ** _ than have the privilege of leading your race to glory? _

And somehow, his thoughts managed to attack that too.

_ How could you think of Carl like that? He’s been nothing but kind to you and here you are, disrespectful and ungrateful. _

His own mind was ripping itself to shreds, and him with it.

Markus turned to face the wall and collapsed heavily on his side. He buried his face in his arm, letting the storm pass over him. Dimly, he registered the fact that he was crying, but he didn’t care.

He’d only been there a few minutes when he felt a feather-light touch at his back. He jerked and sat up, twisting around to see -

Simon. Of course.

Simon reached forward and grabbed his hands, rubbing circles on the backs. “It’s okay,” he murmured. “I’m here for you.”

“I - I’m - I’m -” Markus choked out.

“It’s okay to cry. Tell me everything that’s wrong,” his voice was so gentle, and the tender squeezing of his hands so soothing. 

Markus shifted around in his spot and let himself fall into Simon. His hands released Markus’ and ran up and down his back comfortingly.

He could tell he was mumbling incoherencies against Simon between quiet sobs, but he couldn’t tell what they were meant to convey. He was trying to say a thousand things at once and they were clamoring to be told.

Simon just murmured soothingly and hugged him closer.

After several minutes, the tears had slowed and he could speak clearly and register the world around him.

The first thing he noticed was how  _ warm _ Simon’s embrace was. He nuzzled his chest, reveling in the soft heat.

“You’re so warm,” he mumbled aloud, half-delirious from crying his eyes out, and not thinking straight whatsoever.

Simon laughed quietly. “Thank you?”

Markus pressed his ear to Simon’s chest, listening to all his inner workings and finding comfort in them. The consistent whirr of cooling fans, the electrical hum of wires and batteries, the faintest clicking of some moving components, and, best of all, his thirium pump cycling the blue blood around his body. Its beat was deeper and longer than a human heartbeat, something entirely android, and Markus relished it.

He exhaled a long breath and brought his arms up to wrap around Simon’s waist. He was quickly going past the line of what would really be acceptable for average, platonic relationships, but he just couldn’t bring himself to care.

“Sorry you had to see that,” he murmured.

“It’s fine,” Simon reassured him softly. “If anything, I’m glad you trust me enough to allow me to see that. Everyone breaks down sometimes, Markus, and after what happened today, I . . . I don’t blame you. It’s okay.”

_ How can someone be so selfless and compassionate and kind and gentle and perfect? _ Markus wondered.  _ How can just being around him make me feel better? _

The androids he’d tried to save were still dead. He still thought himself a rather poor leader. He still believed his desire to live with Carl again traitorous and selfish and cowardly.

But everything seemed so much lesser in Simon’s arms. Here, the only thing that mattered was right now. He just felt so . . . safe.

_ I love you _ , he mouthed against Simon, knowing he couldn’t tell what he was saying. His hands dipped to the hem of his shirt and slipped under it so he could slide his hands up Simon’s bare back.

He gasped, almost inaudible, arching his back involuntarily. Markus could feel his artificial muscles rippling under the plastic-like skin. His back was almost hot to the touch, and he let it warm his arms and hands.

Ever-so-slowly, Simon leaned down just slightly and buried his face in Markus’ shoulder.

There was a thrill in Markus’ veins and a great tingling shimmer filling his mind. He was quite certain they were past platonic at this point. He didn’t want it to end. He wanted to stay here, in Simon’s arms, forever.

_ Maybe he likes me back? _ he thought hopefully. 

But then, his exhaustion was too great, in spite of his internal excitement. And, to his eternal embarrassment, he passed out right then and there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I T I S H E R E
> 
> I'm so sorry about the wait! School started and suddenly I didn't have any time to work on it and then it needed a bunch of revision and just asdfghjklshgcdz
> 
> It's here now though! And now that I'm back on track, updates should be at least a LITTLE quicker. Thank y'all so much for your endless support and nice comments! Love each and every one of you!
> 
> For some shitposting shenanigans and more DBH content, check out my blog: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/
> 
> As always, thank you so for much reading! <3


	14. Only Chance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> North and Josh seem cold and distant, which is stressing out Simon. Markus suggests some piano practice to calm him down. But Simon just seems more worried, until Markus manages to coax the truth out of him.

Markus came to slowly. The first thing he noticed was that he’d been in rest mode for about half an hour. The second thing he noticed was the fact that everything seemed a little less painful after his rest. The third thing he noticed was his hard drives dumping memories of his last waking moments into his mind.

The fourth was realizing that his head was resting on something that felt alarmingly like a lap and there were warm hands settled on his shoulder and cradling one side of his head.

He opened his eyes, curious and not nearly awake enough to register his situation.

His head was in Simon’s lap, his body perpendicular to him and one hand rested on Simon’s thigh. Simon was smiling down at him dreamily, those big baby-blue eyes half-lidded, one of his hands lying on Markus’ shoulder and the other rubbing the velvety fuzz of hair on his head.

Suddenly, all of Markus’ systems were online. He realized the enormity of the situation instantly, and his every processor kicked into high gear, scripts speeding up rapidly.

But, even as his mindscape began its descent into Simon-centric chaos, he found himself wanting to stay.  _ Maybe if I close my eyes again, he won’t notice and I can stay here as long as possible- _

“Markus?” Simon whispered.

_ So much for that idea. _

Markus blinked a few times and found himself smiling involuntarily up at Simon. He smiled gently back, looking away from Markus quickly.

He  _ could _ sit up right now, which would be expected and socially acceptable. . .  _ or _ he could stay half-cuddling with Simon, which would be odd and discouraged in normal society.

He decided to take the risk of staying cradled in Simon’s warmth. 

Markus let out a content hum and buried his face in Simon’s leg, earning a surprised squeak that may just have been the cutest noise he’d ever heard. The hand on his shoulder tightened ever-so-slightly, and it took all his willpower not to lean into it.

“Are you alright?” Simon murmured softly.

Markus shifted his head to face him, marveling in how warm and comfortable he was. “I’m better than I was. Did I just . . . pass out here, or . . . ?”

“Yeah, pretty much. You sure you’re okay?” Simon asked, tone impossibly gentle. Markus took a deep breath to cool his internal systems. He was being  _ overwhelmingly _ adorable.

“I’m not . . . I don’t know. I’m better than I was thirty-five minutes ago,” Markus offered. “You being here really helped, more than the rest mode, I’d say.”

Simon nodded sagely, but his eyes were clouded. He was still looking off to the side instead of at Markus.

Markus sat up and yawned. “What about you? You alright?”

“I’m just  - I’m, uh - no, it’s-it’s nothing,” Simon replied.

Markus narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “Simon . . .”

“I’m just . . . worried. About things.”

“What things?”

“Um . . . just, er . . . I don’t want to worry you with my worries,” he stammered.

Markus sighed. “Alright. I won’t push it. I’m here if you change your mind okay?” and then, quieter, “I’m always here for you.”

Simon closed his for a long moment. When he opened them, they were shining with new resolve.

“Do you mind if I check up on North and Josh? I want to make sure they’re doing okay,” he asked.

“Of course. Here, I’ll come with you,” Markus replied gallantly, standing up and pulling Simon to his feet. “Afterwards, do you want to have a session? It might make both of us feel a little better.”

“Yeah, th-that’d be . . . nice,” Simon nodded.

They darted through the abandoned building, made a brief detour so Markus could put on some actual clothes, and continued down into the freighter, down to the side where they had brought the semi.

North wasn’t there.

Simon and Markus traded concerned glances, dread building in both of them.

Without a word, Simon turned around and ran the way they came, Markus racing after him. Simon made a sharp right and skidded into the main chamber. Markus scanned the room quickly and shook his head. With a hiss of frustration and fear, Simon forged on, sprinting into Lucy’s corner.

He stopped dead and Markus nearly slammed into his back. He peered around Simon’s shoulder and relief flooded his entire body.

She was working next to Lucy, slender fingers weaving through an exposed mass of wires from an android’s extended arm. She glanced up and her gaze hardened into steel.

North stood up slowly and picked her way around the android on the floor. Her fiery glare was causing both Simon and Markus to subconsciously shrink back.

“I told you two to leave me alone,” she growled.

Simon took a step forward and enveloped her in a hug. She stiffened, hands tightening into fists, ready to fight, but then relaxed, and hesitantly patted him on the back.

After only a few seconds, Simon pulled back. “We went to check on you and you weren’t at the semi. Don’t scare me like that, okay?”

She stepped back with a scoff and folded her arms. “I’ll tell you next time. Or whatever. Get out of here.”

Simon nodded and hastily left the healer’s corner. He seemed much happier already.

“Now for Josh. The recovery area is over here, so he should be . . . aha!” Simon beckoned Markus and darted over to a curtained off area filled with recently repaired androids. Josh was all the way in the back, arm in a sling and a lost look on his face.

“Hey, Simon,” he greeted dully as they approached. “Hey, Markus.”

Simon knelt beside him, worry overtaking his expression. “Are you okay? Why do you need the sling? Do you need anything?”

“I’m fine,” he replied flatly. “I need the sling because Lucy had to weld the ends of the broken strut in my arm together and it needs to be kept in position until it cools off completely. I don’t need anything.”

“Are you sure?”

“Simon. I’m  _ fine _ .”

“Okay, sorry, I just . . .” he sighed. “You seem a little . . . haunted.”

“Mmm,” Josh responded. Then his dull, uncaring mask broke for just a moment. “I mean, I’ll be fine. Eventually.”

This didn’t seem to satisfy Simon, but he didn’t push it. “Alright. Comm me if you need anything.”

Josh shrugged and Simon’s gaze clouded. He glanced helplessly at Markus and rose to leave.

 

A few minutes later, they were seated before the piano, but neither of them knew what to play. They sat in uncomfortable silence, staring at the keys without moving to touch them.

The high of waking up  _ in Simon’s lap _ was wearing off, and the sheer hopelessness of the situation was beginning to weigh on his shoulders once again. He hadn’t successfully saved all the Traci androids. He hadn’t managed to protect Josh or save North’s friend. Now the police would be on high alert, so they wouldn’t be able to leave the freighter for days  _ again _ , and for what? A few sex-slave corpses and his friends resenting him.

A single, deep piano note banished the ugly thoughts for a moment.

Simon had begun to play.

His song was in minor key, deep and dark and sorrowful. He poured his soul into it, twitching with every note he laid down, lashes glistening. Dark blues and dark grays and storm clouds and rain washing away sidewalk chalk. The song started slow and thoughtful, and then accelerated, fast and tear-jerking, but then it started to slow again. It grew steadily slower and shakier, almost hesitant, until finally it ended on a long, drawn-out note, the same note it had started with.

Simon leaned away from the piano and opened his eyes, blinking a few times. He seemed spent but slightly more relaxed than he was, as if the piano had been a therapy session. Perhaps it had been.

“Simon, that was . . . I don’t . . . I don’t have the words,” Markus said honestly. “That was just . . . incredible. But incredible’s not good enough to describe it. It was . . . it was . . . god, I didn’t know you - anyone! - could play that well.”

Simon looked away, smiling. “Thank you.”

Markus allowed himself to admire him for just a second, his frame against the black velvet of the night sky. His blonde hair gleamed the palest gold in the moonlight.

Then he returned his attention to the piano and sighed.

“I don’t know how I’m supposed to compete with that,” he stated, and it was supposed to be accompanied with a grin but he couldn’t manage it. He settled for a light, joking tone of voice instead.

Simon smiled at him again, and everything was just a little better.

He gave up on trying to make his own piece, and grabbed one from his online library instead. There was one song that he was particularly feeling at the moment, and it also just _ happened _ to be one of Simon’s favorites. It was a popular song back in 2012, and the singer of it had been one of Carl’s favorites.

Without really realizing it, he began singing the lyrics as he played. Simon seemed like he wanted to join in a few times, but each time he leaned back and just listened to Markus instead.

Eventually, the song came to an end, the last note lingering in the air between them.

Simon stared at Markus for a long time, a dazed smile quirking the corners of his mouth. “Markus . . . that was  _ really _ good.”

There was something that thickened in the air in that moment. There was something that had changed in the two of them together, but Markus wasn’t sure what it was.

Markus smiled. “Thank you.”

Simon nodded and looked away again. He’d been acting strange since Markus woke up in his arms. Distracted, subdued, oddly silent, almost nervous.

“Hey, are you okay?” he asked, leaning closer.

Simon’s shoulders twitched, but he didn’t reply.

“Simon?” Markus tried.

He shivered and turned to face Markus. “I’m - uh - fine. I’m fine. I just, um, I’m uh . . . N-nevermind.”

Markus squinted at him. “You don’t  _ seem _ okay.”

A bubble of laughter escaped Simon, though he was clearly trying to hold it back. “I’m fine, really. There’s just . . . there’s something on my mind.”

“What is it?”

“I - I can’t. Right now is a really bad time, and if I tell you, you’ll just be more stressed and I can’t . . . I can’t.”

“Not knowing what’s bothering you and worrying about you all the time is pretty stressful too,” Markus pointed out.

Simon sighed and slid off his seat. He walked over to the edge of the roof, and paused, shoulders slumping. He stared out at the city beyond, glimmering amber with streetlights, for a long moment.

“It’s the wrong moment. Maybe when we’re happier, okay? Right now it’s just . . .” he murmured, almost inaudible.

“I hate to say it but . . . there might not be a better one,” Markus replied honestly. “We both know the risks of our actions. We could die tomorrow.”

Simon winced. “I know, but . . . but . . . but you’re right.”

Markus stood up and crunched through the light snow to stand a few feet behind him, awaiting his answer.

“Okay, when I say this, if you don’t a-agree exactly, I don’t want this to change anything between us, okay?” Simon glanced over his shoulder to look at him.

“Okay,” Markus agreed quickly. Simon turned his head to look out at Detroit once again. There was a full second and a half of deafening silence and then he began to speak.

“I think I’m - n-no, I  _ know _ \- I’m in -” he took a deep breath, “I’m in love with you. I’m really,  _ really _ in love, and I think about it - about  _ you _ \- all the time and that’s why I’ve been acting so weird, because I wanted to tell you - I had to tell you - and I-I-I’ve never felt this way about anyone, not as strong as this, and I just - I want to be around you all the time and it hurts when I’m not and I want to keep you safe and I want you to be happy -  _ I _ want to be making you happy - and just being around you makes me so happy and when you get hurt I-I get  _ scared _ because I can’t lose you - I  _ can’t  _ lose you and -”

“Simon,” Markus interrupted, and Simon turned to face him, eyes wide and scared.

He took a few steps forward so there was only a couple inches space between them, his hands hovering over Simon’s hips but not touching. There was a question in his eyes and he knew Simon saw it.

Simon answered by leaning forward once, hesitantly, and then finally reaching up and pulling Markus against him.

Holy shit, he was kissing Simon.

His hands were resting on Simon’s hips, and Simon’s arms were around his neck, and they were so impossibly close and he could feel the heat radiating from Simon’s body - god, he was just so  _ warm _ \- and everything was lagging and crashing and he couldn’t think, he could only feel and -  _ holy shit, he was kissing Simon. _

They pulled away slowly, gazing into each other’s eyes as if they were their only anchors to reality. Maybe they were.

Simon looked scared again, and he opened his mouth to say something.

“I’m in love with you too,” Markus said simply, before Simon could say anything. His databases were pulling up gifs of fireworks which was both amusing and a little embarrassing.

His fearful expression melted into relief and giddiness and contentment, mixed with uncertainty and disbelief. “Really?”

Markus smiled. “Yes, really.”

Simon relaxed, a smile twitching at his lips and tempting Markus to kiss him again.

“What do we do now?” Simon asked. “I - I feel like it’s a little, um, not disrespectful exactly, but just . . . not quite right, if we’re, y-you know, while North and Josh are . . . recovering, I guess.”

“Hmmm. I agree. North seems to forgiven you for trying to help her earlier, and Josh even said he’ll be fine later on. For now, we’ll try to help and support them as best we can and try not to flaunt anything. We’ll tell them in a few days.”

Simon nodded. “That seems logical,” a small grin curved his lips, “Though not bragging about you is going to be difficult.”

Markus looked away, certain that he was blushing and hating it. “I can’t believe you feel the same way.”

“Me neither,” Simon agreed. “I’m really glad you do, though.”

Neither of them could stop smiling and both of them knew it.

Markus met his gaze once more, analyzing those baby-blue eyes and committing them to long-term memory. They crinkled around the corners when Simon smiled and Markus nearly crashed on the spot.

He realized suddenly that his hands were still at Simon’s hips, but he just couldn’t bring himself to pull away. Simon didn’t seem to mind.

“I’m kind of in a daze about this whole thing,” Markus confessed. “I can’t believe that you - god, it’s just so - it’s too perfect.”  _ You’re too perfect _ , he added silently.

Simon nodded fervently. “I . . . yeah.”

Markus closed his eyes, his smile widening. His thoughts were a complete mess, a tangled maelstrom of  _ I just kissed him holy shit - he kissed me back  _ **_holy shit_ ** _ \- Simon Simon Simon - he loves me - Simon Simon  _ **_Simon_ ** _ \- I can’t believe this - is this actually happening please let this be real - _

He was interrupted from dwelling on his thoughts by a warm weight pressing against his chest. Simon had leaned forward and rested his forehead on Markus’ collarbone.

Markus buried his face in his shoulder. Simon flinched at first but relaxed into his touch.

He felt Simon grin against his skin and he tilted his head back to look at Markus. “This certainly explains a few things. You were acting a little . . . non-platonic.”

Markus smiled sheepishly. “I may have been getting a bit desperate.”

“I don’t mind,” Simon murmured.

They stayed like that for a few minutes, each lost in their own speeding scripts, lost in their own storms of disbelief and desperation and hope and love.

“There’s so much I want to say,” Simon said after a bit. “So many questions and compliments and things I just couldn’t say if you didn’t know.”

“Same here,” Markus agreed.

“But I’m . . . I’m a huge mess right now,” he laughed a little. “North is sad, and Josh is hurt, and you feel the same way about me that I feel about you and I just . . . I’m a little overwhelmed. I want to go curl up in Jericho and analyze all this new data, but at the same time I don’t want to leave, and I just . . .”

Markus grinned, his first since the Eden Club raid. “Same here.”

Simon sighed deeply and stepped out of Markus’ grasp, his arms dropping to his sides, leaving Markus’ surface sensors screaming in protest. “My processors are about to explode. I’m sorry.”

Markus scanned him quickly and winced. “Yeah, they really are. Go get some rest, okay?”

Simon nodded. “I’ll, um, I’ll be back in an hour or so!”

Markus waved as he scampered off.

Then he settled himself in the armchair and realized he couldn’t stop smiling. He closed his eyes and, ignoring the fact that he had a big dumb grin on his face, focused inward. 

He had some things to think about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S HERE  
> THE MOMENT YOU'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR  
> I T ' S H E R E
> 
> AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA writing this was so much fun! It was great to finally write some EXTREME GAY after so much tantalizing! And don't worry folks, we still have plenty more story left to go! There's still tons of angst I need to - er, I mean, there's still tons of fluff and stuff I need to get through before this story's over! :D
> 
> As I said last chapter, I'm trying to get these out more frequently! This one was a little later than I would have liked because some irl stuff came up so I never got the chance to work on it when I wanted to, but it's a start!
> 
> For some shitposting shenanigans and more DBH content, check out my blog: https://trashcanofobsessions.tumblr.com/
> 
> As always, thank you so for much reading! <3


End file.
